OUR 


-.- 


Proportionate  size  of  the  flag  of  the  American  Merchant  Marine  to  the 
domestic  export  and  import  business  covered  by  it,  at  different  periods  since 
1855.  Prospective  size  in  1890?  See  page  24. 


QUESTIONS  OF  THE  DAY.—  III. 


MERCHANT    MARINE 


HOW  IT  ROSE,   INCREASED,   BECAME   GREAT, 
DECLINED  AND   DECAYED 


AN   INQUIRY   INTO  THE   CONDITIONS    ESSENTIAL   TO    ITS 
RESUSCITATION   AND  -FUTURE   PROSPERITY 


BY 

DAVID    A.    WELLS 
\\ 


"Navigation  and  naval  power  are  the  children,  not  the  parents  —  the  effect,  not 
the  cause,  of  commerce."  —  McCuLLOCH. 

The  United  States  treats  commerce  upon  the  ocean  as  an  enemy  to  domestic 
industry.  Great  Britain  fosters  commerce  as  an  aid  to  her  home  industries,  and 
as  the  carrier  that  provides  markets  for  her  manufactures. 


NEW  YORK 
G.    P.    PUTNAM'S    SONS 

27   AND  29  WEST  230  STREET 
1882 

f 


COPYRIGHT  BY 

G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 

1882 


Press  oj 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 
New  York 


PREFACE. 


THE  expulsion  of  the  Moors  and*  Jews  from  Spain  under  Fer- 
dinand and  Isabella  and  their  successors,  and  the  repeal  of  the 
"  Edict  of  Nantes,"  which  deprived  France  of  her  best  artisans 
and  industries,  have  been  accepted  by  all  historians  and  econo- 
mists as  the  two  most  striking  and  exceptional  examples  in 
modern  times,  of  great  national  industrial  disaster  and  decay 
directly  contingent  on  unwise  and  stupid,  but  at  the  same  time 
deliberately  adopted,  state  policies.  It  has  been  reserved  for  the 
United  States,  claiming  to  be  one  of  the  most  enlightened  and 
liberal  nations  of  the  world,  after  an  experience  of  near  three 
hundred  years  since  the  occurrence  of  the  above  precedents,  to 
furnish  a  third  equally  striking  and  parallel  example  of  results 
contingent  on  like  causes,  in  the  decay  and  almost  annihilation 
of  her  merchant  marine  and  ocean  carrying  trade,  —  a  branch 
of  her  domestic  industry  which  formerly,  in  importance,  ranked 
second  only  to  agriculture.  It  is  proposed  to  tell,  in  the  following 
pages,  the  story  of  this  happening,  and  to  endeavor  to  deduce 
from  a  record  of  sad  and  mortifying  experience,  what  changes  in 
federal  statutes  and  national  policy  are  essential  to  resuscitate 
and  again  make  prosperous  our  shipping  interest. 

The  narrative   and   arguments   embodied  in  this  volume  were 


iv  PREFACE. 

originally  prepared  at  the  suggestion  and  request  of  W.  H.  Huri- 
burt,  Esq.,  editor  of  "  The  New- York  World,"  and  first  appeared 
in  the  columns  of  that  journal,  in  the  early  part  of  1881.  As  now 
presented,  they  have  been  carefully  revised,  and  in  great  part 
re-written,  and  made  to  include  the  results  of  more  recent  experi- 
ences and  continued  investigations. 
NORWICH,  CONN.,  May,  1882. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    THE  PERIOD  OF  DEVELOPMENT  AND  PROSPERITY  i 

II.    THE  PERIOD  OF  DECADENCE 20 

III.  THE  CAUSES  OF  THE  DECADENCE  OF  THE  AMERICAN  MER- 

CHANT MARINE 45 

IV.  OUR  NAVIGATION  LAWS,  AND  HOW  THEY  ORIGINATED  .        .      58 
V.    THE  PROVISIONS  OF  OUR  NAVIGATION  LAWS  ....      75 

VI.    How  AND  WHY  GREAT  BRITAIN  REPEALED  HER  NAVIGATION 

LAWS,   AND  THE   RESULTS   OF  REPEAL 95 

VII.    THE  DISCUSSION  OF  REMEDIES 109 

VIII.    OBJECTIONS   TO   THE    REPEAL  OF  OUR  NAVIGATION    LAWS 

STATED  AND   CONSIDERED 128 

IX.    OBSTACLES  IN   THE   WAY   OF   THE    RESTORATION   OF  THE 
MERCHANT    MARINE    OF    THE    UNITED   STATES,    OTHER 

THAN  OUR  NAVIGATION  LAWS 171 

X.    THE  FUNDAMENTAL  CAUSE  OF  THE  DECAY,  AND  THE  PRES- 
ENT MAIN  OBSTACLE  IN  THE  WAY  OF  THE  RESUSCITATION 
OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES   .       .    194 
CONCLUSION  208 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE   PERIOD    OF    DEVELOPMENT   AND    PROSPERITY. 

IT  is  proposed  to  here  ask  the  attention  of  the  public  to 
a  popular  but  comprehensive  exhibit  of  that  department 
of  American  commerce  and  industry  which  is  concerned 
in  the  business  of  transporting,  through  the  medium  of 
vessels,  merchandise  and  passengers  between  the  United 
States  and  foreign  countries ;  its  origin  and  development, 
its  present  condition  and  causes  of  decay,  and  its  possible 
future. 

The  presentation  and  discussion  of  economic  questions 
are  not  matters  which  for  the  last  twenty-five  or  thirty 
years  have  found  much  favor  with  the  masses  of  the 
American  people.  The  problem  of  slavery,  the  war,  and 
the  political  and  social  questions  involved  in  the  recon- 
struction of  the  Confederate  States,  have  largely  pre- 
occupied public  attention  during  this  period ;  while  the 
resources  of  the  country,  the  energies  of  our  people,  and 
their  skill  in  the  invention  and  application  of  machine- 
ry, have  under  ordinary  conditions  always  and  so  easily 


2  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

brought  such  large  returns  of  material  abundance  as  to 
cause  the  nation  to  regard  with  almost  complete  indiffer- 
ence the  existence  of  economic  evils  which  in  less-favored 
countries  would  have  been  in  a  high  degree  obstructive 
of  all  prosperity.  In  fact,  the  nation,  in  its  economic 
experience,  may  be  not  inaptly  compared  to  those  stalwart 
specimens  of  manhood  which,  in  virtue  of  their  superb 
physical  constitutions,  seem  to  be  able  with  impunity  to 
set  sanitary  laws  at  defiance  ;  shirking  no  hardships  or 
exposures,  careless  in  respect  to  nutriment,  reckless  in 
the  use  of  stimulants,  and,  in  the  exuberance  of  present 
health,  disposed  to  regard  any  word  of  warning  for  the 
future  as  something  for  which  there  is  no  occasion.  But, 
though  in  exceptional  cases  there  may  be  long  delay,  the 
penalty  of  violated  sanitary  and  economic  laws  alike  is 
always  ultimately  exacted :  in  the  one  case  through  vari- 
ous forms  of  physical  disease  or  premature  decrepitude, 
and  in  the  other  through  an  unnecessary  inequality  in  the 
distribution  of  wealth,  the  promotion  of  class,  sectional, 
or  national  antagonisms,  and  the  partial  or  total  arrest  of 
national  development.  The  denial  by  this  nation  to  a 
portion  of  its  people  of  the  freedom  of  their  persons  and 
the  ownership  of  the  products  of  their  labor,  although 
such  denial  was  for  a  long  time  claimed  by  those  inter- 
ested to  be  economically  successful,  was  ultimately  settled 
for  by  a  vast  expenditure  of  blood  and  treasure.  The 
continued  use  of  bad  and  dishonest  money  after  the 
war  —  first  occasioning  inflation  and  then  collapse  —  was 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE,  3 

a  prime  factor  in  producing  the  financial  revulsions  of 
1873,  and  in  maintaining  the  subsequent  five  long  years 
of  commercial  bankruptcy  and  industrial  stagnation  ;  while 
the  long-continued  national  policy  of  restricting  the  free 
use  of  certain  of  the  necessary  instrumentalities  of  com- 
mercial exchange  is  at  last  so  manifestly  resulting  in  such 
a  rapid  and  complete  destruction  of  an  industry  which 
formerly  ranked  second  only  in  importance  in  this  coun- 
try to  agriculture,  that  the  nation  for  the  first  time  seems 
now  willing  to  become  interested  and  instructed,  and  to 
appreciate  the  necessity  in  this  specialty  of  prompt  reme- 
dial legislation.  To  discuss  remedies  in  respect  to  ail- 
ments in  the  body  politic,  no  less  than  in  the  body 
physical,  before  thoroughly  making  what  in  medical  lan- 
guage is  termed  a  diagnosis  of  the  situation,  is,  however, 
but  empiricism  and  quackery;  and  any  possible  resulting 
advantage  from  such  a  course  cannot  be  other  than  acci- 
dental. Let  us,  therefore,  in  the  first  instance,  endeavor 
to  find  out  and  comprehend  the  exact  situation. 

The  Building  and  Use  of  Ships  in  North  America  during 
its  Colonial  Period. 

The  building  and  use  of  ships  were  employments 
which  the  founders  of  the  North  American  Colonies  and 
their  descendants  subsequently,  until  within  a  very  recent 
period,  may  be  said  to  have  adopted  naturally ;  and  from 
the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  until  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century — a  period  of  two  hundred  years  — 


4  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

they  were  the  two  industries  whose  competition  England, 
with  good  cause,  especially  dreaded.  In  fact,  within 
little  more  than  twenty-five  years  after  the  settlement  of 
New  England,  or  in  1650,  the  English  Parliament,  in  full 
accord  with  the  then  spirit  of  the  age,  felt  it  necessary  to 
enact  a  statute  for  the  avowed  purpose  of  protecting  Eng- 
lish shipping  against  the  competition  of  the  English  plan- 
tations in  America ;  which  statute  was  followed  during  the 
next  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  by  a  series  of  twenty- 
nine  further  separate  enactments,  all  tending  to  the  same 
•end,  namely,  restriction  of  colonial  trade.  By  the  statute 
of  1650  the  export  and  import  trade  of  the  English  Colo- 
nies was  restricted  to  English  or  Colony  built  ships  ;  and 
by  the  statute  of  1663  nothing  was  allowed  to  be  im- 
ported into  a  British  plantation  except,  in  an  English- 
built  ship,  "  whereof  the  master  and  three-fourths  of  the 
crew  are  English." 

But  notwithstanding  these  restrictions  the  business  of 
ship-building  and  ship-using  in  the  American  Colonies 
was  one  that  would  not  stay  restricted,  but  continued  to 
grow  in  spite  of  all  efforts  of  the  mother  country  to  the 
contrary.  At  the  time  of  the  breaking-out  of  the  Ameri- 
can Revolution,  and  for  long  afterwards,  there  were  more 
people  in  the  northern  part  of  New  England  —  Maine  and 
New  Hampshire  —  engaged  in  ship-building  and  in  navi- 
gation than  there  were  in  agriculture  ;  and  Massachusetts 
at  the  same  time  was  estimated  to  have  owned  one  vessel 
for  every  hundred  of  its  inhabitants.  The  enactment  of 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  5 

arbitrary  laws  on  the  part  of  Great  Britain  to  prevent  her 
American  colonists  from  freely  participating  in  the  carry- 
ing trade  and  commerce  of  the  ocean  was,  however,  a  sore 
grievance,  and  ultimately,  as  is  .well  known,  constituted 
one  of  the  prime  causes  of  the  American  Revolution. 
They  were,  furthermore,  from  the  very  first  either  openly 
or  secretly  resisted  and  evaded  ;  and  under  their  influence 
the  colonists  became  a  nation  of  law-breakers.  Nine- 
tenths  of  their  merchants  were  smugglers.  One-quarter 
of  all  the  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  were 
bred  to  commerce,  to  the  command  of  ships,  and  to  con- 
traband trade.  Hancock,  Trumbull  (Brother  Jonathan), 
and  Hamilton  were  all  known  to  be  cognizant  of  or 
participants  in  contraband  transactions,  and  approved  of 
them.  Hancock  was  the  prince  of  contraband  traders, 
and  with  John  Adams  as  his  counsel  was  appointed  for 
trial  before  the  Admiralty  Court  in  Boston,  at  the  exact 
hour  of  the  shedding  of  blood  at  Lexington,  in  a  suit  for 
five  hundred  thousand  dollars  penalties  alleged  to  have 
been  incurred  by  him  as  a  smuggler. 

Opinions  of  the  Fathers,  and  the  Original  Policy  of  the 
New  Republic. 

The  pertinency  of  the  introduction  of  these  historical 
facts  in  this  connection,  is  to  be  found  in  the  evidence 
they  embody  of  the  opinions  entertained  by  the  founders 
of  the  Republic  respecting  the  justice  or  expedience  of 
laws  arbitrarily  enacted  for  the  restriction  of  commerce 


6  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

and  the  freedom  of  trade.  Men  like  Hancock,  Trumbull, 
and  Hamilton,  who  were  merchants  before  they  became 
statesmen,  had,  as  the  result  of  personal  experience,  been 
led  to  feel  that  the  Government  of  Great  Britain,  in  en- 
deavoring through  such  laws  to  restrain  the  colonists 
from  engaging  freely  in  a  department  of  otherwise  lawful 
industry,  and  from  enjoying  the  fruits  of  their  labors,  con- 
travened their  natural  rights,  re-affirmed  the  principle  of 
slavery,  and  became  their  enemy.  Every  evasion  of  such 
statutes  was  therefore,  in  their  view,  a  blow  in  favor  of 
liberty.  Hence  also  the  origin  of  that  count  in  the  in- 
dictment against  the  king  of  Great  Britain,  embodied  in 
the  Declaration  of  Independence,  "of  cutting  off  our  trade 
with  all  parts  of  the  world." 

Such  were  the  views  of  the  men  who  a  hundred  years 
ago  were  accounted  the  wisest  of  American  patriots  and 
statesmen.  It  is  curious  also  to  note  how  subsequently 
an  attempt  was  made,  under  the  influence  of  these 
same  old-time  statesmen,  to  incorporate  the  idea  of  free 
commerce  and  unrestricted  trade  with  all  nations  as  a 
part  of  the  fundamental  and  permanent  policy  of  the 
new  Republic.  Thus,  up  to  the  period  of  the  American 
Revolution,  treaties  of  commerce  between  nations  had 
been  little  other  than  agreements  to  secure  special  and 
exclusive  privileges  to  the  contracting  parties,  and  to 
antagonize  as  far  as  possible  the  commercial  interests 
of  all  other  countries.  But  in  the  treaty  of  commerce 
entered  into  between  France  and  the  United  States 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  7 

in  1778,  the  commissioners  of  the  two  nations —  Frank- 
lin, Deane,  Lee,  and  Gerard  —  evidently  determined  to 
attempt  to  inaugurate  a  more  generous  policy,  and  estab- 
lish a  precedent  for  freer  and  better  commercial  relations 
between  different  countries  than  had  hitherto  prevailed. 
It  was  accordingly  agreed  in  the  treaty  in  question  to 
avoid  "all  those  burdensome  prejudices  which  are  usually 
sources  of  debate,  embarrassment,  and  discontent,"  and  to 
take  as  the  "  basis  of  their  agreement  the  most  perfect 
equality  and  reciprocity."  And  they  further  stated  the 
principle  which  they  had  adopted  as  a  guide  in  their  nego- 
tiations to  be,  that  of  "founding  the  advantages  of  com- 
merce solely  upon  reciprocal  utility  and  the  just  rules 
of  free  intercourse."  The  commissioners  were,  however, 
ahead  of  their  times,  as  they  even  yet  would  be,  if  still 
alive  and  participating  in  the  public  policy  of  the  United 
States.  The  traditions  and  habits  of  Europe  were  also 
too  strong  to  be  at  once  broken  down.  The  prevailing  idea 
then  everywhere  was,  that  whatever  of  advantage  one  na- 
tion or  country  gained  in  trade  and  commerce  necessarily 
entailed  an  equal  and  corresponding  loss  upon  some  other 
nation  or  country ;  and  in  the  end  the  Americans  suc- 
cumbed ;  and  within  a  comparatively  few  years  their  own 
country,  falling  into  the  rut  of  old  prejudice,  enacted  (as 
will  be  hereafter  shown)  a  commercial  code  as  illiberal 
and  narrow  in  most  respects  as  any  that  had  preceded  it, 
and  which  still  stands  as  the  most  striking,  and  in  fact  the 
only,  relic  of  the  unchristian  and  barbarous  commercial 


8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

legislation  which  everywhere  characterized  the  eighteenth 
century. 

History   of   the    United-States  Mercantile   Marine  subse- 
quent to  the  Revolution. 

At  the  time  of  the  formation  of  the  Constitution  in 
1789,  the  registered  tonnage  of  the  United  States,  by 
which  is  to  be  understood  the  tonnage  engaged  in  foreign 
trade,  was  123,893  tons.  During  the  next  succeeding 
eight  years,  or  from  1789  to  1797,  it  increased  384  per 
cent ;  but  this  remarkable  increase  was  exceptional,  and 
was  due  to  the  almost  universal  state  of  war  in  Europe, 
which  threw  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world  in  an  equal 
degree  into  our  hands.  Between  1797  and  1807  the  in- 
crease was  42  percent,  or  from  597, 777.  tons  to  848,307 
tons.  Between  1807  and  1837  there  was  no  increase,  but 
periods  of  decrease  (as  between  1811  and  1814  and  1818 
and  1825)  and  again  of  partial  recovery,  so  that  in  1837 
the  amount  of  American  registered  tonnage  was  only 
810,000  tons,  or  about  38,000  tons  less  than  it  was  thirty 
years  previously,  or  in  1807.  Subsequent  to  1837  the  in- 
crease was  again  rapid,  rising  from  810,000  in  that  year  to 
1,241,000  in  1847,  to  2,463,000  in  1857,  and  culminating 
with  2,642,000  tons  in  1861,  or  at  the  period  of  the  out- 
break of  the  war.  The  maximum  tonnage  of  the  United 
States  at  any  one  time,  registered  and  enrolled  (or  en- 
gaged in  foreign  and  domestic  trade)  and  in  the  fisheries, 
was  in  1861,  namely,  5,539,813  tons.  The  tonnage  of  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  9 

world  at  that  time,  divided  among  the  different  nationali- 
ties, was  also  approximately  as  follows  :  — 

TONS. 

Belonging  to  the  United  States  .  .'  .  .  .  5,539,813 
Belonging  to  Great  Britain  and  her  dependencies  .  .  5,895,369 
Belonging  to  all  other  nations 5,800,767 

The  aggregate  tonnage  belonging  to  the  United  States  in 
1 86 1  was  therefore  but  a  little  smaller  than  that  of  Great 
Britain,  and  nearly  as  large  as  the  entire  tonnage  of  all 
maritime  nations  combined,  with  the  exception  of  Great 
Britain.  In  respect  to  the  international  carrying  trade  of 
the  world,  the  United  States  had  more  tonnage  engaged 
than  all  other  nations  combined,  exclusive  of  Great  Brit- 
ain. 

Another  point  of  great  importance  to  be  noted  in  this 
connection,  and  one  which  has  been  generally  overlooked 
in  all  recent  discussions  of  the  decadence  of  American 
shipping,  is  that  from  1855  to  1860,  the  period  when  the 
American  shipping  interest  attained  its  greatest  prosper- 
ity, the  tonnage  of  the  United  States  engaged  in  foreign 
trade  was  more  than  50  per  cent  in  excess  of  what  would 
have  been  requisite  to  carry  all  the  exports  and  the  im- 
ports of  the  country;  or,  in  other  words,  if  American 
vessels  had  exclusively  moved  all  our  exports  and  all  our 
imports  from  1855  to  1860,  there  would  have  remained 
some  1,300,000  tons  of  American  shipping  to  be  other- 
wise accounted  for  in  respect  to  business.  But  as  the 
American  vessels  did  not  at  that  time  exclusively  carry 


IO  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

all  our  imports  and  exports,  and  as  fully  25  per  cent  of 
the  foreign  trade  of  the  United  States  was  then  done  by 
foreign  vessels,  it  follows  that  the  tonnage  of  the  United 
States  in  1855-60,  which  was  in  excess  of  the  immediate 
trade  requirements  of  the  country,  was  much  more  than 
1,300,000  tons.  Now,  what  was  all  this  surplus  tonnage 
(amounting  in  the  aggregate  to  more  than  the  entire  ton- 
nage now  owned  by  the  United  States  and  engaged  in  for- 
eign trade)  at  that  time  employed  about  ?  What  was  it 
doing  ?  There  is  no  trouble  in  returning  an  answer  that 
will  not  be  disputed  or  in  any  degree  questioned.  It  was 
earning  money  and  profits  for  its  owners  and  the  country. 
It  was  in  the  employment  of  foreigners,  and  engaged  in  a 
trade  with  which  the  United  States  had  no  connection 
except  as  a  carrier.  It  was  flying  the  flag  of  the  United 
States  in  every  part  of  the  world  where  there  was  any 
thing  to  buy  or  sell,  to  exchange  and  get  gain,  and  was 
acquiring  in  addition  to  immediate  wealth  the  promise  of 
large  gains  for  the  future  in  that  mercantile  knowledge 
and  experience  of  the  trade  and  productions  of  foreign 
countries  which  practical  business  intercourse  with  them 
can  alone  impart.  In  this  business  it  not  unfrequently 
happened  that  the  American  ships  engaged  did  not  re- 
turn for  years  to  their  home  ports;  while  from  1850  to 
1860  there  was  not  a  year  in  which  a  large  amount  of 
American  tonnage  —  65,000  tons  in  1855 — was  not 
transferred  by  sale  to  foreign  ownership. 

Attention   should  also  be  here  called  to  the  circum- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 1 

stance  that  the  remarkable  results  as  above  detailed  were 
achieved  at  a  time  when  the  differences  in  the  wages  of 
seamen,  and  the  cost  of  stores,  rigging,  etc.,  on  American 
vessels,  in  favor  of  their  foreign  competitors,  were  very 
marked,  if  not  fully  as  great  as  at  present.  The  expla- 
nation of  this  anomaly  is,  that  the  crews  of  American 
vessels,  although  paid  higher  wages  than  the  seamen  of 
any  other  nationalities,  were  more  efficient ;  consequently 
fewer  men  were  needed,  which  reduced  the  cost  and  risk 
of  navigation,  and  this  last  in  turn  reduced  the  cost  of 
insurance,  as  compared  with  English  ships,  even  in 
English  companies.  The  Americans,  also,  very  early 
introduced  labor-saving  machines  and  mechanism,  as  for 
managing  the  top-sails,  handling  and  lifting  the  anchor, 
loading  and  unloading  freights,  which  also  largely  dis- 
pensed with  the  necessity  of  manual  labor.  In  a  report 
recently  made  (1880)  to  the  Legislature  of  Massachusetts 
by  the  Harbor  Commissioners  of  Boston,  attention  is 
called  to  the  circumstance  that  even  now  the  method  of 
procedure  in  unloading  vessels  at  American  wharves  is 
greatly  superior  to  that  followed  in  the  famous  docks  of 
London  and  Liverpool,  and  as  involving  especially  less 
manual  labor.1  Vessels  of  the  United  States  at  the  time 

1  When  I  landed  at. Liverpool,  the  engineer  of  the  Mersey  Docks  told  me 
that  in  the  handling  of  goods  America  had  little  to  learn  in  Europe,  and  that 
he  had  sent  his  assistant  to  America,  last  year,  to  examine  our  system  of 
handling  goods,  in  order  that  he  might  introduce  in  his  new  docks  and  ware- 
houses, now  building  in  Liverpool,  all  American  improvements.  Still  he  said 


12  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

under  consideration  were  better  modelled,  and,  being 
better  modelled  and  better  handled,  they  sailed  faster, 
and  as  a  general  rule  could  make  four  voyages  while  the 
Englishman  under  similar  circumstances  and  with  similar 
vessels  could  make  but  three.  American  ship-owners  con- 
sequently obtained  more  freight  and  often  better  prices, 
—  a  sixteenth  of  a  penny  more  per  pound,  for  example, 
in  cotton  ;  and  in  English  ports,  other  things  being  equal, 
English  merchants  preferred  to  ship  in  American  rather 
than  in  British  bottoms.  In  1857,  when  the  rebellion  in 
India  broke  out,  and  the  British  Government  found  it 
necessary  to  despatch  troops  and  stores  with  the  greatest 

there  was  one  thing  in  which  Europe  was  in  advance  of  America,  and  that 
was  the  use  of  hydraulic  machinery.  This  I  found  to  be  true,  and  no  dock 
visited  was  found  without  large  hydraulic  engines  and  hydraulic  cranes. 
But  it  was  laughable  at  times  to  see  how  goods  were  handled  so  carefully,  so 
easily,  and  so  cheaply,  by  this  splendid  machinery,  and  then  to  see  the  whole 
saving  wasted.  For  instance,  at  Antwerp  a  vessel  with  broken  pig-iron  was 
being  discharged  by  one  of  the  beautiful  hydraulic  swinging  cranes  of  Sir 
William  Armstrong.  The  iron  was  hoisted  from  the  hold  in  a  large  tub, 
which,  instead  of  being  swung  over  to  the  car  standing  upon  the  track  only 
fifteen  feet  away,  and  then  dumped,  was  lowered  to  the  deck,  and  then  the 
iron  was  handled  piece  by  piece,  and  placed  in  a  basket,  the  basket  placed 
upon  a  man's  shoulder,  and  the  man  walked  down  a  plank  to  the  dock,  up 
another  plank  on  the  farther  side  of  the  car,  and  then  dumped  his  basket 
into  the  car.  It  was  in  vain  to  ask  why  the  tub  was  not  swung  and  then 
dumped,  —  they  never  did  it  so. 

In  London,  with  a  hydraulic  crane  lying  idle  alongside  the  ship,  bale  goods 
were  rolled  from  the  car  down  to  the  pier,  and  then  rolled  up  again  to  the 
vessel's  deck.  To  the  question,  "  Why  do  you  do  so  ? "  the  answer  was, 
"  We  always  have."  —  Report  W.  P.  Phillips,  1881. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  13 

promptitude,  the  vessels  that  were  first  chartered,  at  the 
highest  prices,  which  were  most  relied  upon,  and  did  the 
best  service,  were  the  magnificent  American-built  clippers 
at  that  time  largely  engaged  in  the  India  and  China  trade. 
The  fact  here  noted,  namely,  that  under  apparently  the 
most  adverse  circumstances  the  ships  of  the  United 
States  engaged  in  foreign  trade  were  achieving  the  most 
marked  success  over  all  foreign  competitors,  also  long  ago 
attracted  the  attention  of  Daniel  Webster;  and  in  a  speech 
in  opposition  to  one  of  Mr.  Clay's  protective  tariff  bills, 
he  made  use  of  the  following  language :  — 

"  If  any  thing  should  strike  us  with  astonishment,"  he  said,  "  it  is 
that  the  navigation  of  the  United  States  should  be  able  to  sustain 
itself.  Without  any  government  protection  whatever,  it  goes  abroad 
to  challenge  competition  with  the  whole  world;  and  in  spite  of  all 
obstacles  it  has  yet  been  able  to  maintain  eight  hundred  thousand 
tons  in  the  employment  of  foreign  trade.  How,  sir,  do  ship-owners 
and  navigators  accomplish  this  ?  How  is  it  that  they  are  able  to  meet, 
and  in  some  measure  to  overcome,  universal  competition?  It  is  not, 
sir,  by  protection  and  bounties,  but  by  unwearied  exertion,  by  extreme 
economy,  by  unshaken  perseverance,  by  that  manly  and  resolute  spirit 
which  relies  on  itself  to  protect  itself.  These  causes  alone  enable 
American  ships  still  to  keep  their  element  and  show  the  flag  of  their 
country  in  distant  seas.  But  when  we  consider  that  the  articles  enter- 
ing into  the  composition  of  a  ship,  with  the  exception  of  wood,  are 
dearer  here  than  in  other  countries,  we  cannot  but  be  utterly  surprised 
that  the  shipping  interest  has  been  able  to  sustain  itself  at  all." 

In  making  this  statement  Mr.  Webster  clearly  expressed 
the  exact  situation ;  and,  with  this  record  of  remarkable 


14  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

success  under  great  difficulties,  it  seems  clear  that  the 
more  remarkable  decadence  which  has  since  befallen  the 
American  shipping  interest  cannot  be  rightfully  referred 
to  natural  causes,  but  must  be  the  result  of  artificial 
agencies,  and,  therefore,  within  the  province  of  remedy. 

This  curious  condition  of  affairs  has  also  not  escaped 
the  attention  of  foreign  investigators  in  this  department 
of  economic  history;  and  Mr.  W.  S.  Lindsay,  in  his 
"History  of  Merchant  Shipping"  (London,  1876),  thus 
comments  upon  it:  — 

"  When,  towards  the  close  of  the  war  of  independence,  the  struggle 
for  supremacy  commenced,  the  shipping  of  both  England  and  America 
was  under  the  leading-strings  of  their  respective  legislators.  England 
would  not  then  allow  American  vessels  to  trade  with  most  of  her  vast 
possessions,  and,  while  thus  nursing  her  ship-owners,  prevented  the 
mass  of  her  people  from  deriving  the  advantages  invariably  flowing 
from  a  natural  and  wholesome  competition.  Nor  did  she,  indeed, 
confer  any  real  benefit  on  this  favored  class :  on  the  contrary,  she 
taught  them  to  lean  on  protection  instead  of  depending  on  their  own 
skill  and  industry.  The  consequences  were  apparent  in  even  the 
earlier  results  of  the  struggle.  Having  ample  fields  for  employment 
exclusively  their  own,  English  ship-owners  did  not  enter  with  their 
wonted  energy  into  the  direct  carrying  trade  between  their  own  coun- 
try and  America,  which  was  so  rapidly  developed  after  the  Americans 
had  become  independent:  they  remained  satisfied  with  those  branches 
of  commerce  expressly  secured  to  them  by  law,  and  did  not  care  to 
continue  their  vessels  in  the  trade  with  America  in  a  competition,  on 
equal  terms,  with  those  of  that  country,  especially  when  they  found 
they  would  have  to  produce  a  superior  class  of  vessels,  and  to  use 
extra  exertions,  to  make  this  trade  pay  as  well  as  did  their  protected 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  15 

branches  of  over-sea  commerce  without  the  additional  trouble  of  im- 
provements. It  was  otherwise  with  the  shipping  of  the  United  States, 
for  there  was  then  no  other  branch  of  over-sea  trade  where  the  laws 
of  nations  allowed  them  to  compete  on  equal  terms  with  foreign 
vessels." 

"  Although  possessing  the  advantage  of  vast  forests  of  lumber,  the 
American  ship-builders  were  obliged  to  import  their  iron  from  Great 
Britain,  their  hemp  from  Russia,  and  many  other  articles  necessary 
for  their  equipment  from  other  and  distant  countries :  they  did  not, 
therefore,  especially  as  skilled  labor  was  higher  at  home  than  in 
Europe,  engage  in  the  struggle  with  any  special  advantages  ;  but,  being 
equal  in  energy  and  industry,  they  had  the  incalculable  advantage  of 
being  obliged  to  depend  on  themselves.  They  consequently  set  to 
work  to  construct  that  description  of  merchant-vessel  likely  to  yield 
the  most  remunerative  returns,  adopting  the  best  mechanical  contriv- 
ances within  their  reach  so  as  to  reduce  navigation  to  the  smallest 
cost  consistent  with  safety  and  efficiency.  And  the  world  soon  saw 
the  results  of  their  labors  in  their  celebrated  '  Baltimore  clippers,' 
and  the  still  more  celebrated  '  American  liners,'  which  for  a  consider- 
able period  almost  monopolized  the  carrying  trade  between  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States. 

"  Yet,  strange  to  say,  though  the  superiority  of  the  merchant-ves- 
sels of  the  United  States  soon  became  only  too  apparent,  scarcely  any 
improvements  were  adopted  by  Great  Britain,  or,  indeed,  by  any  other 
nation,  until  wiser  statesmen  than  had  hitherto  guided  the  councils  of 
this  country  swept  away  the  whole  paraphernalia  of  her  navigation 
laws,  and  left  the  ship-owners  to  rely  entirely  on  their  own  resources. 
This  superiority  consisted  mainly  in  the  fact  that  American  ships 
could  sail  faster,  and  carry  more  cargo  in  proportion  to  their  regis- 
tered tonnage,  than  those  of  their  competitors.  But  their  improve- 
ments did  not  rest  here.  In  considering  the  expenses  of  a  merchant- 
man, manual  labor  is  one  of  the  most  important  items :  and  herein  our 


16  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

competitors,  by  means  of  improved  blocks  and  various  other  mechan- 
ical appliances,  so  materially  reduced  the  number  of  hands,  that 
twenty  seamen  in  an  American  sailing-ship  could  do  as  much  work, 
and  probably  with  more  ease  to  themselves,  than  thirty  in  a  British 
vessel  of  similar  size.  With  such  ships  we  failed  to  compete." 


Origin  and  Development  of  the  Ocean  Steam-Marine 
of  the  United  States. 

The  statistics  of  our  shipping  thus  far  presented  have 
not  discriminated  between  sailing-vessels  and  steamers. 
But  there  is  a  point  just  here  of  no  little  importance  as 
throwing  light  on  what  subsequently  happened.  It  is  this. 
British  foreign  steam-shipping  practically  dates  from  1838, 
when  the  "  Sirius  "  and  "  Great  Western,"  the  two  pioneer 
vessels,  crossed  the  Atlantic  to  New  York.  The  increase 
in  this  department  was  at  first  very  slow  ;  and  thirteen 
years  later,  or  in  1851,  the  total  British  steam-tonnage 
engaged  in  foreign  trade  was  only  65,921  tons.  The  for- 
eign steam-shipping  of  the  United  States  may  be  said  to 
date  from  1848,  when  it  amounted  to  about  16,000  tons. 
For  a  number  of  years  next  subsequent,  its  increase  was 
so  rapid  that  in  1851  the  foreign  steam-tonnage  of  the 
United  States  and  Great  Britain  were  almost  equal ;  that 
of  the  former  being  62,390  tons,  and  that  of  the  latter 
65,921  tons.  During  the  single  year  1849-50  we  in- 
creased our  ocean  steam-tonnage  113  per  cent;  and  the 
sea-going  qualities  and  performances  of  our  vessels  were 
so  admirable,  that  the  Cunard  Company;  which  had  then 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  17 

been  in  operation  ten  years,  was  obliged  to  bring  out  new 
ships  to  compete  with  them.  The  prospect,  therefore,  at 
one  time  was  that  the  United  States,  although  late  in  the 
start  in  this  new  department  of  foreign  shipping,  would 
soon  equal,  if  not  overtake,  her  great  commercial  competi- 
tor. And  after  1851  the  American  growth  steadily  con- 
tinued down  to  1855,  when  our  aggregate  steam-tonnage 
engaged  in  foreign  trade  amounted  to  115,000  tons.  But 
from  that  time  there  was  no  more  immediate  progress,  but 
a  retrograde  movement;  so  that  in  1862  the  aggregate 
foreign  steam-commerce  of  the  United  States  was  less  by 
2,000  tons  than  it  was  in  1855.  But  even  before  the  out- 
break of  the  war,  or  in  1860-61,  "there  were  no  ocean 
mail-steamers,  away  from  our  own  coasts,  anywhere  on 
the  globe  under  the  American  flag,  except,  perhaps,  on 
the  route  between  New  York  and  Havre,  where  two 
steamships  may  then  have  been  in  commission,  which, 
however,  were  soon  afterwards  withdrawn.  The  two  or 
three  steamship-companies  which  had  been  in  existence 
in  New  York  had  either  failed  or  abandoned  the  business  ; 
and  the  entire  mail,  passenger,  and  freight  traffic  between 
Great  Britain  and  the  United  States,  so  far  as  this  was 
carried  on  by  steam,  was  controlled  then  (as  it  mainly  is 
now)  by  British  companies."  l  After  the  war  our  foreign 
steam-tonnage  revived  a  little,  and  amounted  to  221,939 
tons  in  1869;  since  when  it  has  every  year  grown  smaller 
and  smaller,  and  for  the  year  1880  was  145,604  tons. 

1  Hamilton  A.  Hill:  Report  to  the   United   States   National   Board  of 
Trade,  1868. 


1 8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

Progressive  Decadence  of  the  Merchant   Marine  of  the 
United  States  subsequent  to  1855. 

The  year  1855  further  marks  a  great  natural  division  in 
the  history  of  the  entire  foreign  mercantile  marine  and 
ship-building  industry  of  the  United  States.  The  record 
thus  far  is  substantially  a  record  of  most  remarkable  prog- 
ress and  prosperity.  The  record  hereafter  is  to  be  a 
record  of  decadence  and  disaster,  which,  considering  the 
magnitude  of  the  capital  and  interests  involved,  is  almost 
without  a  parallel  in  the  history  of  modern  civilization. 

What  has  happened  in  the  twenty-seven  years  that  have 
now  elapsed  since  1855  may  be  best  realized  by  the  follow- 
ing statistical  statements  :  Our  aggregate  tonnage  of  every 
description — registered  and  enrolled,  sail  and  steam,  em- 
ployed upon  the  ocean,  upon  the  lakes,  upon  our  rivers 
and  harbors  —  has  declined  from  5,539,813  tons  in  1861, 
to  4,057,734  in  1881,  —  a  reduction  of  nearly  27  per  cent. 

Our  tonnage  engaged  in  foreign  trade  has  declined  dur- 
ing the  same  period  from  2,496,894  tons  to  1,335,586,  a 
reduction  of  over  54  per  cent. 

The  aggregate  of  tonnage  of  every  description  built  in 
the  United  States  in  1855  was  583,450;  in  1861,  233,194 
tons;  and,  in  1880,  157,409  tons,  — a  reduction  in  annual 
increment  since  1855  of  73  per  cent,  and  since  1861  of 
32  per  cent.  How  rapidly,  furthermore,  this  former  great 
branch  of  American  industry  is  decaying,  may  be  also 
illustrated  by  the  statement  that  the  American  tonnage 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  19 


built  in  1880  was  35,622  less  than  in  1879,  an^  78,095 
tons  less  than  in  1878.  There  was  a  falling-off  in  the 
shipbuilding  of  the  New  England  States  during  1880,  of 
9,500  tons  as  compared  with  1879,  44,012  tons  as  compared 
with  1878,  and  105,123  as  compared  with  1875  ;  while 
for  our  entire  seaboard  —  Atlantic,  Gulf,  and  Pacific  — 
the  tonnage  built  in  1880  was  142,755  tons  less  than  the 
product  of  1875.  For  the  year  1881,  the  record  as  com- 
pared with  that  of  1880  shows  that  the  progress  of  decay 
still  continues,  and  is  as  follows  :  decrease  in  the  total 
tonnage  of  the  country,  10,299  tons;  decrease  in  the 
number  of  vessels  engaged  in  foreign  trade  52,  and  in  ton- 
nage 17,224.  In  respect  to  vessels  engaged  in  the  coast- 
ing trade  and  fisheries,  there  were  595  less  number  of 
vessels  employed,  but  an  increase  of  6,924  tons.  In  the 
cod  and  mackerel  fisheries  there  was  a  decrease  of  203  in 
the  number  of  vessels,  and  of  1,402  in  tonnage.  In  the 
whale-fishery  there  was  no  increase  or  decrease  reported 
in  respect  to  either  number  of  vessels  or  tonnage.  There 
was  a  decrease  in  sailing-tonnage  of  15,866,  but  an  in- 
crease of  53,440  tons  in  steam-tonnage.  The  amount  of 
new  tonnage  constructed  in  1881  was  123,048  greater  than 
in  1880,  or  a  total  of  280,458  in  1881  as  compared  with 
157,400  in  1880;  but  of  this  increase  61,578  was  cred- 
ited to  canal-boat  and  barge  constructions.  The  construc- 
tion of  one  iron  sailing-vessel  of  36  tons  was  reported, 
and  of  28,319  new  iron  steam-tonnage;  a  gain  of  1,359 
tons  as  c'ompared  with  the  construction  of  1879,  and  a  loss 
of  4,778  as  compared  with  the  results  of  1874. 


20  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 


CHAPTER   II. 

THE    PERIOD    OF    DECADENCE. 

The  Decadence  of  American  Shipping  not  coincident  with, 

nor  occasioned  by,  the   War. 

THE  decline  in  American  ship-building  and  in  the 
American  carrying  trade  upon  the  ocean  did  not,  as  is 
popularly  supposed,  commence  with  the  war,  and  was 
not  occasioned  by  the  depredations  of  the  Confederate 
cruisers.  These  agencies  simply  helped  on  a  decadence 
that  had  previously  commenced,  and  .which  probably 
would  have  progressed  just  as  far  as  it  now  has,  had  no 
war  intervened.  The  first  symptoms  of  the  decadence  ap- 
peared in  1856,  in  the  falling-off  in  the  sales  of  American 
tonnage  to  foreigners  ;  the  reduction  being  from  65,000 
in  1855  to  42,000  in  1856,  to  26,000  in  1858,  and  to 
17,000  in  1860.  During  the  war,  however,  the  transfers 
of  American  tonnage  to  foreign  flags  again  increased 
very  largely,  and,  for  the  years  1862  to  1865  inclusive, 
amounted  to  the  large  aggregate  of  824,652  tons,  or  to 
more  than  one-fourth  of  all  the  registered  tonnage  (the 
tonnage  engaged  in  foreign  trade)  of  the  United  States  in 
1860.  But  these  transfers,  it  is  well  understood,  were  not 
in  the  nature  of  ordinary  business,  but  for  the  sake  of 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  21 

obtaining  a  more  complete  immunity  from  destruction 
upon  the  high  seas  than  the  United  States  at  that  time 
was  able  to  afford. 

The  year  1856  also  marks  the  time  when  the  growth 
of  our  foreign  steam-shipping  was  arrested,  and  a  retro- 
grade movement  inaugurated ;  so  that,  as  before  stated, 
our  aggregate  tonnage  in  this  department  was  1,000  tons 
less  in  1862  than  it  was  in  1855. 

The  "total  tonnage  of  every  description  built  in  the 
United  States  also  declined  from  583,450  tons  in  1855 
(the  largest  amount  ever  built  in  any  one  year)  to  469,393 
in  1856,  378,804  in  1857,  and  212,892  in  1860,  a  reduc- 
tion of  68  per  cent  in  five  years. 

During  the  year  1855,  American  vessels  carried  75.6 
per  cent  of  the  value  of  the  exports  and  imports  of  the 
United  States.  After  1855  this  proportion  steadily  de- 
clined to  75.2  per  cent  in  1856,  70.5  in  1857,  66.9  in  1859, 
and  65.2  in  1861,  the  year  of  the  outbreak  of  the  war.1 

Notwithstanding  this,  the  records  of  the  United  States 
Treasury  Department  show  that  the  aggregate  of  Ameri- 

1  The  assertion  is  sometimes  made,  that  the  origin  of  the  decay  of  the 
mercantile  marine  of  the  United  States  is  due  in  part  to  the  reduction  of  the 
tariff  in  July,  1857  ;  but  there  is  not  the  slightest  ground  for  any  such  suppo- 
sition. The  decadence-  in  question,  as  above  demonstrated,  commenced  two 
years  previously ;  and,  although  there  was  a  commercial  depression  and  re- 
vulsion in  1857,  it  was  due  mainly  to  excessive  railroad  construction,  and  was 
not  of  long  duration;  and  the  succeeding  three  years,  or  from  1858  to  1860 
inclusive,  were  among  the  most  prosperous  years  in  the  history  of  the 
country. 


22  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

can  tonnage  engaged  in  foreign  trade  and  the  total  aggre- 
gate of  the  entire  mercantile  marine  of  the  United  States 
were  greater  in  1861  than  at  any  former  period.  Whether 
it  was  at  this  latter  date  all  profitably  employed,  as  it  cer- 
tainly was  at  an  earlier  period,  cannot  now  be  affirmed. 

But  the  changes  which  have  taken  place  within  the  last 
twenty-six  years  in  the  ocean  carrying  trade  of  the  United 
States  constitute  by  far  the  most  striking  illustrations  of 
the  tremendous  decadence  and  wreck  which  our  foreign 
maritime  commerce  and  commercial  marine  have  within 
that  period  experienced.  During  the  whole  period  be- 
tween 1855  and  1860  there  was,  as  before  noticed,  at  least 
a  million  and  a  half  of  American  tonnage  exclusively  in 
foreign  employ ;  "  carrying  cargoes  from  foreign  ports  to 
foreign  ports,  for  foreigners,  to  be  used  by  foreigners, 
and  in  which  business  Americans  had  no  direct  interest 
but  to  receive  their  freight  money,  to  be  sent  home  and 
added  to  the  productive  capital  of  the  country."  Of  this 
great  and  profitable  business  a  small  proportion  probably 
yet  remains,  but  how  much  it  is  difficult  to  state  with 
accuracy. 

But  let  us  next  look  fairly  and  squarely  at  another, 
even  more  discouraging  picture.  In  1855,  of  the  total 
value  of  all  the  exports  from  and  of  all  the  imports  into 
the  United  States,  the  American  commercial  marine  trans- 
ported 75.5  per  cent.  The  record  of  the  experience  of 
the  twenty-six  years  that  have  since  elapsed  may  be  pre- 
sented in  the  form  of  a  tablei  and  also  illustrated  pictori- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2$ 

ally.  We  ask  the  reader  to  take  a  good  long  loolc  at  the 
first,  and  not  allow  himself  or  herself  to  be  repelled  by  the 
array  of  figures,  for  nothing  like  it  is  to  be  found  in 
American  history. 

Percentage  Exports  and  Imports  carried  in   Vessels  of  the 
United  States  from  1855  to  1882. 

YEARS.                                                                                                                                         PER  CENT. 
1856 75.2 

1857 70-5 

1859 66.9 

1861 65.2 

1863 41.4 

1865  .'.... 27.7 

1867 33.9 

1870 35.6 

1872 28.5 

1874 26.7 

1878 25.9 

1879   ..........    22.6 

1880 17.6 

iSSi 16.2 

Or,  to  sum  up  in  a  few  words,  of  the  goods,  wares,  and 
merchandise  exported  and  imported  into  the  United 
States  during  the  fiscal  year  1881,  American  vessels 
transported  only  16.2  per  cent,  and  foreign  vessels  83.8 
per  cent. 

Again :  If  the  flag  of  the  Union,  as  borne  by  the  com- 
mercial marine  of  the  United  States  on  the  high  seas, 


24  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

had  shrunk  during  the  past  twenty-six  years  in  proportion 
to  the  shrinkage  of  the  domestic  export  and  import  busi- 
ness which  it  formerly  covered,  the  size  of  the  flag  at  dif- 
ferent periods  since  1855  would  find  representation  in  the 
accompanying  diagrams.  (See  Frontispiece^) 

But,  startling  as  are  these  figures  and  results,  and  por- 
tending as  they  do  unmistakably  the  almost  complete 
disappearance  of  the  flag  of  the  United  States  from  the 
ocean,  they  fail  to  convey  the  exact  truth  of  the  situation. 
For  it  is  to  be  borne  in  mind,  that,  while  the  business  of 
our  shipping  has  been  rapidly  disappearing,  the  opportu- 
nities for  business  have  at  the  same  time  been  increasing 
in  a  far  more  rapid  ratio  (the  increase  in  the  international 
commerce  of  the  globe  between  1850  and  1880  being 
estimated  as  high  as  240  per  cent) ;  or,  to  put  the  case 
differently,  while  there  never  was  so  much  business  calling 
for  the  employment  of  merchant  vessels  in  the  history  of 
the  world  as  at  the  present  time,  the  extent  to  which  the 
capital  and  industry  of  the  United  States  participate  in 
this  business  is  annually  growing  less  and  less.  Thus, 
taking  merely  the  trade  of  the  United  States  as  an  ex- 
ample, we  find  that  out  of  a  total  value  of  exports  and 
imports  in  1860  of  $762,000,000,  the  value  transported  in 
American  vessels  was  $507,000,000,  or  66.5  per  cent;  but 
in  1 88 1,  out  of  a  total  value  of  exports  and  imports  of 
$1,676,636,000,  American  vessels  transported  a  value  of 
but  $268,080,000,  or  15.2  per  cent,  a  little  more  than  one- 
half  of  what  was  done  twenty-two  years  ago,  or  in  1860; 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2$ 

whereas  the  value  of  the  commodities  transported  in 
foreign  vessels  was  more  than  six  times  as  great  in  1881 
as  in  1860. 

Increase  of  Foreign  Tonnage  engaged  in  Trade  with  the 
United  States  since  1860. 

Of  the  enormous  increase  in  the  foreign  commerce  of 
the  United  States  since  1860,  as  above  noted,  every  mari- 
time nation  of  any  note,  with  the  exception  of  the  United 
States,  has  taken  a  share.  American  tonnage  alone  ex- 
hibits a  decrease.  Thus,  comparing  1880  with  1856,  the 
foreign  tonnage  entering  the  seaports  of  the  United 
States  increased  nearly  eleven  millions  of  tons ;  whereas 
the  American  tonnage  entered  during  the  same  period 
exhibits  a  decrease  of  over  65,000  tons.  British  tonnage 
increased  its  proportion  from  935,000  tons  in  1856  to 
7,903,000  in  1880;  Germany,  during  the  same  time,  from 
166,000  to  1,089,000;  and  Sweden  and  Norway  from 
20,662  to  1,234,000.  Austria,  limited  to  almost  a  single 
seaport,  jumped  up  from  1,477  tons  *n  ^56  to  206,000 
tons  in  1880,  and  had,  in  1879,  J79  large-class  sailing-ves- 
sels engaged  in  the  American  trade. 

Sleepy  Portugal  increased  during  the  same  period  from 
4,727  tons  to  24,449  tons.  Spain,  distracted  with  intestine 
feuds  and  dragged  down  with  debt  and  taxation,  increased 
from  62,813  tons  in  1856  to  227,496  in  1880;  while 
Russia,  whose  vessels  participated  in  our  trade  in  1856 
to  the  extent  of  only  40  tons,  in  1880  reported  104,049  tons. 


26  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE, 

During  the  year  1881,  there  was  shipped  from  New 
York  to  Europe,  grain  to  the  extent  of  72,276,000  bushels ; 
but  not  one  solitary  bushel  of  this  enormous  quantity  found 
transportation  in  an  American  vessel.  In  1880  we  did 
carry  1,328,436  bushels,  out  of  a  total  of  113,343,163  bush- 
els, but  in  1 88 1  not  a  bushel.  In  1880  there  were  seven 
nationalities  —  Danish,  Dutch,  French,  Portuguese,  Rus- 
sian, Spanish,  and  Swedish  —  that  carried  less  than  we 
did;  but  in  1881  they  all  outstripped  us,  and  left  us  with- 
out even  a  place  on  the  list.  Of  this  shipment,  British 
vessels  carried  62  per  cent.  Italy  took  the  second  place, 
carrying  over  5,000,000  bushels  ;  Belgium  stood  third  on 
the  list,  Norway  fourth,  Germany  fifth,  and  Austria  sixth. 

Comparative  Exhibit  of  the  Present  Condition  of  the  Indus- 
tries of  Ship-building  and  Ship-using  in  the  United 
States  and  Other  Countries. 

As  already  stated,  the  tonnage  of  the  United  States 
(including  coasting,  inland,  and  fisheries)  in  1861  was 
only  a  little  less  than  that  of  Great  Britain, — namely, 
5,539,000  and  5,895,000  respectively.  For  the  year  1881, 
the  aggregate  tonnage  of  the  United  States  was  4,057,- 
734,  as  compared  with  4,068,034  in  1880.  Of  this  aggre- 
gate for  1 88 1,  1,057,430  was  employed  on  the  Northern 
lakes  and  Western  rivers ;  442,000  was  canal-boats  and 
barges,  and  64,947  was  licensed  and  under  20  tons.  The 
tonnage  engaged  in  foreign  trade  in  1881  was  1,335,000, 
as  compared  with  2,496,000  in  1861  ;  and  in  the  coasting- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2? 

trade,  2,657,000  in  1881,  as  compared  with  2,704,000  in 
1 86 1  ;  the  exclusive  privileges  granted  by  our  navigation 
laws  to  this  department  of  our  industry  not  having  sufficed 
to  even  enable  it  to  hold  its  own. 

The  officially  registered  tonnage  of  Great  Britain  for 
the  year  1880  was  6,574,513;  but  the  aggregate  tonnage 
of  the  mercantile  marine  that  carries  the  British  flag  is 
estimated  at  a  much  higher  figure,  —  16,000,000,  according 
to  some  authorities.  Of  sailing-vessels,  Great  Britain 
registered  in  1880,  19,938;  and  is  estimated  to  own  more 
than  one-third  of  the  ocean  sailing-vessel  tonnage  of  the 
world.  Of  the  steam-marine  of  the  world,  Great  Britain 
is  estimated  to  own  sixty-three  per  cent,  registering,  in 
1880,  5,247  vessels,  with  an  aggregate  tonnage  of  2,723,- 
468.  To  appreciate  the  significance  of  these  figures  it 
is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind,  that,  in  the  case  of  every 
new  steamship,  the  increase  in  the  instrumentalities  of 
commerce  is  to  be  measured,  not  so  much  by  the  single 

| 

item  of  its  tonnage,  as  by  its  carrying  power;  and  that, 
with  the  same  amount  of  tonnage  capacity,  the  carrying 
power  of  a  steamer  is  estimated,  on  an  average,  at  fourfold 
that  of  a  sailing-vessel.  The  2,723,000  steam-tonnage  of 
Great  Britain,  therefore,  really  represents,  according  to 
the  old  standard,  10,892,000  tons.  In  1880  the  United 
States  had  only  146,604  steam-tonnage,  iron  and  wood, 
engaged  in  the  foreign  carrying  trade  of  the  ocean ;  or 
75,000  tons  less  than  in  1868. 
The  tonnage  of  iron  vessels  —  sail  and  steam  —  built  in 


28  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  United  States  during  the  six  years  from  1876  to  1881 
inclusive  amounted  to  only  127,298  tons;  and  this  trifling 
amount  was  almost  .entirely  for  our  coastwise  or  home 
trade,  in  which  no  foreign  competition  whatever  is  al- 
lowed under  the  provisions  of  our  navigation  laws.  No 
iron  sailing-vessels  were  built  in  the  United  States  be- 
tween 1871  and  1880;  but  during  the  years  1880  and  1881 
a  construction  of  44  and  36  tons  respectively  was  officially 
reported.  The  total  tonnage  of  all  the  iron  vessels  in  the 
United  States  in  1880,  exclusive  of  barges,  was  263,637; 
embracing  4  iron  sailing-ships,  of  2,168  tonnage,  and  325 
iron  steam-vessels  of  261,469  tonnage.  Of  this  iron 
steam-tonnage,  only  34  vessels,  of  70,640  aggregate  ton- 
nage, were  engaged  in  foreign  trade. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  tonnage  of  the  iron  vessels  built 
in  Great  Britain  during  the  six  years  from  1876  to  1881, 
inclusive,  was  in  excess  of  2,000,000  tons  ;  and  every  year 
exhibits  an  increase  in  the  amount  of  such  constructions. 
For  the  year  1881,  the  "out-turn"  of  new  ships  in  Great 
Britain  was  reported  at  over  600,000  tons  gross.  On  the 
3ist  of  December,  1881,  the  tonnage  then  under  construc- 
tion was  the  largest  ever  reported  ;  viz.,  515  steamers,  with 
a  total  tonnage  of  958,377,  and  127  sailing-ships,  with  a 
tonnage  of  130,440. 

More  than  eighty  steamers  of  3,000  tons  and  upwards 
were  in  construction  at  one  time  in  the  course  of  the  year 
1 88 1.  Every  shipyard  in  the  United  Kingdom,  capable 
of  supplying  orders,  was  fully  employed ;  and  prices, 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2$ 

simply  by  reason  of  the  inability  of  builders  to  meet  the 
demands  made  upon  them,  considerably  advanced.  Moss 
&  Co.,  the  leading  British  ship-reporters,  close  their  circu- 
lar for  December,  1880,  with  this  remark:  "Altogether, 
we  know  no  industry  so  fairly  remunerative  all  round  as 
modern-built  steamers."  Attention  should  here  also  be 
called  to  the  circumstance  that  the  orders  on  British  ship- 
yards for  these  new  constructions  come  from  almost  every 
maritime  nationality  in  Europe,  except  Norway  and  Swe- 
den (which,  as  a  rule,  still  adhere  to  wooden  vessels  of 
moderate  size),  and  even  from  China  and  Japan.  With 
the  exception  of  the  United  States,  Italy,  and  Spain,  all 
the  maritime  nations  of  the  world  are  rapidly  increasing 
their  mercantile  steam-marine,  and  the  pecuniary  returns 
of  the  business  of  recent  years  are  considered  as  fully 
warranting  the  continued  additions. 

The  following  are  some  of  the  latest  reported  results  :  — 
The  German  mercantile  marine,  although  entering  the 
field  of  competition  at  a  comparatively  late  period,  and 
when  apparently  every  route  of  advantage  had  been  pre- 
occupied by  Great  Britain,  has  been  highly  successful. 
For  the  year  1881,  the  Hamburg-American  line  of  steam- 
ers is  reported  to  have  paid  10  per  cent  dividends  on  its 
stock,  and  to  have  also  largely  augmented  its  surplus. 
The  Hamburg  South-American  line  paid  a  dividend  in 
1880,  of  10  per  cent,  and  was  obliged  to  charter  an  addi- 
tional steamer  in  1881,  in  order  to  accommodate  its  in- 
creased business.  The  Hamburg  steamship-line  to  China, 


30  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

consisting  of  nine  vessels,  is  reported  as  paying  n  per 
cent  dividends,  with  its  shares  quoted  at  158.  A  new 
steamship-line  from  Hamburg  to  the  west  coast  of  Africa 
will  commence  to  run  regularly  during  the  current  year. 
The  increase  in  the  freight  movement  of  Hamburg  for  the 
year  1881  was  25  percent  to  the  Pacific  coast  of  South 
America,  22  per  cent  to  China,  and  17  per  cent  to  Brazil 
and  La  Plata. 

The  fiscal  report  of  the  Cunard  Company  for  1880  shows 
net  earnings  sufficient  to  provide  for  all  interest,  deprecia- 
tion, and  insurance  of  vessels,  and  a  dividend  on  its  stock 
of  6  per  cent  per  annum  ;  which  is  far  better  than  the  aver- 
age return  from  most  investments  in  government  and  rail- 
way stocks  and  securities.  We  have,  therefore,  in  this 
record  a  sufficient  answer  to  the  assertion  so  frequently 
made  in  the  United  States,  "that  there  is  no  money  in  the 
ocean  carrying  trade,  and  therefore  it  is  not  worth  while 
for  Americans  to  attempt  to  participate  in  it." 

With  the  commencement  of  the  present  year  (1882),  a 
new  line  of  steamers  has  been  started  by  the  Austro-Hun- 
garian  Lloyds  —  a  company  which  already  employs  some 
eighty  vessels,  mainly  in  the  East  India  trade  —  to  run  be- 
tween Trieste,  New  York,  and  Brazil ;  and  since  the  with- 
drawal of  the  "  Roach  "  (United-States)  solitary  monthly 
steamer  between  New  York  and  Brazil,  two  lines  of  steam- 
ers, carrying  the  British  flag,  have  come  on  in  its  place, 
carrying  merchandise  at  lower  charges  and  the  mails  as 
promptly  and  more  frequently. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  31 

Holland  is  rapidly  increasing  her  ocean  steam-marine ; 
and  especially  strengthening  its  line  between  Amsterdam 
and  Java  and  Sumatra,  by  the  addition  of  new  and  larger 
vessels. 

Although  it  has  been  generally  assumed  that  Greece, 
in  view  of  its  population,  resources,  and  position,  has  con- 
siderably more  than  its  proportion  of  the  world's  carrying 
trade,  yet  the  Greeks  themselves  appear  to  have  acquired 
a  sudden  conviction  that  greater  maritime  expansion  is 
indispensable  to  their  national  development.  Two  large 
steamship  companies  are  accordingly  now  forming  in 
Greece,  for  participation  in  the  South  American  and  East 
India  trade  ;  the  proprietorship  and  management  of  which 
it  is  proposed  shall  be  entirely  national,  and  which  shall 
enter  into  direct  competition  with  all  other  foreign  flags. 
And  with  a  view  of  further  directly  encouraging  Greek 
vessels  to  engage  in  foreign  trade,  it  is  proposed  to  pay 
premiums  on  voyages  to  South  America  and  the  East 
Indies,  to  suppress  all  consular  fees,  to  prevent  consuls 
from  having  any  interest  in  salvage  cases,  to  introduce  im- 
provements in  harbor  regulations  for  the  more  speedy 
despatch  of  vessels,  and  to  further  enlarge  and  encourage 
schools  of  navigation. 

But  the  most  notable  event  in  the  recent  experiences 
of  the  world's  merchant-marine  is  the  appearance  of  the 
Chinese  in  the  field  of  competition,  and  the  marked  suc- 
cess which  has  thus  far  attended  their  undertakings  in  this 
department  of  productive  industry.  Ten  years  ago  the 


J2  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

China  Merchants'  "Steam  Navigation  Company"  started 
with  two  small  steamers  in  the  coasting  and  river  trade  of 
that  country,  and  relying  for  the  most  part  on  borrowed 
capital.  It  has  now  a  fleet  of  28  steamers,  of  20,000  tons 
carrying  capacity,  and  a  capital  of  2,600,000  taels  ($5,250,- 
ooo),  on  which  the  net  profits  for  1880  are  reported  to  have 
been  21  per  cent.  Encouraged  by  this  success,  this  com- 
pany have  during  the  past  year,  and  as  preliminary  to  the 
establishment  of  regular  lines,  despatched  steamers,  with 
officers  and  crews  composed  entirely  of  Chinese,  to  the 
Sandwich  Islands,  to  San  Francisco,  and  to  London  ;  and  it 
is  not  at  all  improbable,  but  on  the  contrary  almost  certain, 
that  within  the  next  ten  years  the  "Dragon  flag"  of  the 
Celestial  Empire  will  be  as  familiar  to  the  eye  in  our  own 
harbors,  as  that  of  the  various  European  nationalities. 
The  Chinese  commercial  fleet,  thus  far,  is  almost  exclu- 
sively of  "British  build;"  but  during  the  past  year  an 
iron  vessel  for  the  Chinese  imperial  navy  has  been  con- 
structed in  Germany.  That  the  Chinese  in  the  immediate 
future  are  likely  to  be  large  purchasers  of  vessels  and 
machinery  from  foreign  nations,  is  also  extremely  proba- 
ble ;  but  that  the  United  States,  in  view  of  its  policy 
toward  the  Chinese,  would  be  likely  to  obtain  any  share  in 
this  business,  even  if  our  shipyards  and  mechanics  were 
prepared  for  it,  is,  to  say  the  least,  very  doubtful. 

The  one  European  nation  whose  commercial  marine  ex- 
hibits a  decadence  in  any  degree  comparable  with  that 
experienced  by  the  United  States  is  Italy ;  and  the  causes 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  33 

operative  to  decay,  as  will  be  hereafter  shown,  are  essen- 
tially the  same  in  both  cases.  Between  1869  and  1879, tne 
decrease  in  Italian  ship-building  was  officially  reported  at 
80  per  cent ;  and  during  the  same  period,  no  fewer  than  50,- 
ooo  men  connected  with  Italian  ship-building  and  naviga- 
tion were  obliged  to  seek  other  employments.  The  exports 
and  imports  of  Italy  under  the  Italian  flag  are  also  stead- 
ily decreasing;  and  in  the  year  1879  alone,  the  effective 
strength  of  the  Italian  mercantile  marine  was  diminished 
to  the  extent  of  529  vessels,  representing  an  aggregate  of 
23,385  tons. 

As  regards  France,  there  seems  to  be  a  natural  inca- 
pacity of  that  nation  to  successfully  compete  for  any  large 
share  of  the  ocean  carrying  trade  ;  and  the  amount  of  ton- 
nage of  all  classes  of  vessels  turned  out  by  the  French 
shipyards  during  recent  years,  has  been  comparatively 
small.  With  a  view,  however,  of  changing  the  situation, 
the  French  government  have  within  the  last  year  (1880- 
81)  instituted  a  most  extensive  system  of  bounties  for 
the  development  of  its  shipping  interests.  What  may  be 
the  ultimate  result  of  this  policy  cannot,  as  yet,  be  defi- 
nitely predicted ;  but  it  is  at  least  safe  to  affirm  that  the 
present  supremacy  which  Great  Britain  now  enjoys,  of  the 
ocean  carrying  trade,  cannot  be  materially  injured  by  any 
competition  which  needs  adventitious  aid  in  order  to  sim- 
ply exist. 


34  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

The  Losses  contingent  upon  the  Decay  of  oitr  Merchant 

Marine. 

From  this  review  of  the  situation,  some  general  idea  can 
be  obtained  of  the  losses,  direct  and  indirect,  which  the 
United  States  has  sustained  within  the  last  twenty-five 
years  in  the  great  department  of  domestic  industry  under 
consideration  as  measured,  in  ship-building  and  in  the 
business  for  which  ships  are  constructed  and  used.  Let 
us  next  endeavor  to  gauge  the  amount  of  these  losses  as 
measured  in  money.  And,  first,  as  respects  the  business 
of  ship-building  and  ship-repairing. 

In  1855  the  amount  expended  in  the  United  States  in 
the  construction  of  new  vessels  was  estimated  at  about 
$25,0x30,000  per  annum  ;  -and  a  sum  considerably  in  excess 
of  this  for  the  repair  and  rebuilding  of  old  vessels  ;  or  a 
total  for  this  branch  of  domestic  industry  of  from  $55,- 
000,000  to  $60,000,000  per  annum.  The  bulk  of  this  large 
expenditure  was  very  largely  for  the  labor  of  construction. 
A  present  annual  expenditure  in  the  United  States  of 
$25,000,000  for  similar  purposes  would  probably  be  an 
over  rather  than  an  under  estimate.  We  start  off  in  the 
money  account,  therefore,  with  a  loss  to  the  industry  and 
business  of  the  country,  in  the  two  items  of  ship-building 
and  ship-repairing,  of  from  $30,000,000  to  $35,000,000  per 
annum. 

Attention  is  next  asked  to  the  losses  contingent  upon 
our  abandonment  of  the  ocean  carrying  trade. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  35 

The  business  of  transporting  merchandise  or  passen- 
gers by  land  or  by  sea  is  as  much  a  productive  industry 
as  the  raising  of  wheat,  the  spinning  of  fibres,  or  the 
smelting  or  forging  of  iron.  It  adds  to  human  comfort,  it 
supplies  wants,  makes  values,  increases  abundance.  We 
compass, the  land  for  opportunities  for  the  employment  of 
labor  and  for  markets  for  the  product  of  labor ;  and  we 
hold  that  civilization,  national  power,  and  national  wealth 
depend  on  the  success  with  which  these  ends  are  profit- 
ably attained.  We  formerly  were  equally  as  eager  and 
equally  as  successful  in  compassing  the  seas  for  the  same 
ends ;  but  latterly  we  are  as  a  nation  abandoning  this 
sphere  of  enterprise  and  industry,  and  the  question  of  im- 
mediate interest  is,  What  have  we,  as  a  nation,  lost  by  so 
doing  ? 

And  in  reasoning  upon  this  subject,  it  is  important  to 
bear  in  mind  that  in  foreign  commerce  the  freights  paid 
on  the  things  transported  are  as  much  exports  or  imports 
as  the  merchandise  which  is  exported  or  imported.  Thus, 
if  2,000  tons  of  coal  of  the  value  of  $10,000  are  sent  in  a 
vessel  of  the  United  States  to  China,  and  the  freight  on 
the  same  is  $6,000,  this  freight  is  as  much  of  an  export  of 
the  results  of  American  industry  as  the  coal  itself;  and,  if 
paid  and  returned  to  the  United  States  in  the  form  of  coin 
or  tea  or  silk,  may,  and  under  ordinary  circumstances  will, 
add  as  much  proportionally  to  the -general  wealth  of  the 
country  as  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  the  coal  upon  which 
the  freight  was  earned.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  coal  is 


36  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

transported  in  a  foreign  vessel,  the  freight  earned  does 
not  increase  the  capital  or  benefit  the  labor  of  the  United 
States,  but  of  the  country  to  which  the  vessel  belongs. 
In  the  case  of  importations  the  freights  paid  on  the  same 
add  to  the  cost  and  increase  the  volume  or  value  of  the 
things  imported ;  and,  if  foreign  vessels  are  employed,  ac- 
crue exclusively  to  the  benefit  of  the  vessel  and  the  coun- 
try of  its  ownership,  as  much  so  as  does  the  amount  paid 
for  the  import  on  which  the  freight  was  earned.  In  other 
words,  if  the  tonnage  of  foreign  vessels  engaged  in  the 
foreign  import  trade  of  the  United  States  at  present  earn 
annually  for  themselves  some  $45,000,000  to  $50,000,000 
(as  they  do),  such  earnings  must  be  classed  as  foreign 
imports,  and,  in  default  of  an  export  of  domestic  com- 
modities of  corresponding  value,  must  be  settled  for  in 
gold,  or  approved  securities.  The  value  of  such  freight 
imports  is  not  generally  known  or  considered  in  the  dis- 
cussion of  foreign  commercial  relations,  and,  with  a  bal- 
ance of  trade  largely  in  favor  of  the  United  States  (as  at 
present,  1882)  is  not  a  disturbing  element ;  but  if  through 
a  diminished  demand  for  our  agricultural  products,  or 
other  causes,  the  value  of  our  merchandise  exports  and 
imports  should  be  nearly  or  completely  equalized,  the  im- 
portance of  this  freight  item  of  imports  would  be  very 
quickly  made  manifest.  On  the  contrary,  if  the  imports 
are  transported  in  American  vessels,  the  freights  paid 
accrue  to  American  labor  and  capital ;  and  to  the  extent  to 
which  that  labor  and  capital  has  been  profitably  employed 
they  add  to  the  wealth  of  the  United  States. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  37 

If,  however,  by  reason  of  natural  conditions  and  circum- 
stances, the  exports  and  imports  of  the  United  States  can 
be  transported  more  cheaply  and  conveniently  by  the 
people  and  vessels  of  foreign  countries  than  by  our  own 
people  and  vessels,  it  would  be  fighting  against  nature, 
and  a  waste  of  resources,  to  attempt  to  have  it  otherwise 
by  paying  subsidies  (using  this  term  in  the  sense  of  ex- 
traordinary payments),  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  hiring 
people  to  do  what  naturally  it  is  not  for  their  interest  to 
do.  But  if,  on  the  contrary,  our  inability  to  compete  with 
foreigners  in  the  carrying  trade  of  the  ocean  is.  the  result 
of  our  own  bad  management  and  stupidity,  then  the  fail- 
ure so  to  do  is  such  a  loss  of  opportunity  and  waste  of 
resources  as  would,  if  general,  result  in  complete  national 
impoverishment  and  decrepitude.1 

The  amount  annually  paid  for  the  transport  of  the 
exports  and  imports  of  the  United  States  is  variously  esti- 


1  In  "The  North  American  Review  "for  June,  1880,  Professor  Sumner, 
in  an  article  entitled,  "  Shall  Americans  own  Ships  ? "  contends  that  it  is 
immaterial  whether  they  do  or  not ;  and  that  their  sole  matter  of  concern 
should  be  to  secure  freights  at  the  lowest  possible  rates,  and  apply  themselves 
exclusively  to  such  industrial  pursuits  as  pay  best  at  home.  As  an  abstract 
proposition,  this  position  is  undoubtedly  logical :  for,  when  men  are  free  to 
decide  as  to  what  business  they  will  engage  in,  they  will  always  select  that 
which  seems  to  offer  the  best  promise  of  profit ;  and  they  require  no  outside 
help  from  legislation  to  instruct  them  on  this  point.  But,  in  the  case  under 
consideration,  the  citizens  of  the  United  States  are  not  free ;  for  the  policy 
of  their  government  does  not  permit  them  to  profitably  engage  on  equal 
terms  with  foreign  shipowners. 


38  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  t 

mated  by  different  authorities,  and  admits  of  being  only 
approximately  determined.  The  most  reliable  estimates  are 
undoubtedly  those  which  have  been  recently  made  by  Mr. 
Henry  Hall  of  New  York  with  the  co-operation  of  Dr.  E. 
H.  Walker,  the  former  statistician  of  the  New  York  Prod- 
uce Exchange,  and  published  in  "The  Atlantic  Monthly" 
for  February,  1881.  By  this  writer  the  total  payments  for 
freight  money  on  American  exports  for  the  calendar  year 
1879  are  fixed  at  $88,000,000  as  a  minimum,  and  about 
$45,000,000  on  imports,  or  an  annual  total  of  $133,000,000. 
For  the  fiscal  year  ending  June  30,  1880,  Mr.  Hall  also 
reports  18,000,000  of  gross  tons  of  the  produce  and  manu- 
factures of  the  United  States  as  exported,  and  3,900,000 
tons  of  the  produce  and  manufactures  of  foreign  countries 
as  imported  into  the  United  States;  the  exports  —  grain, 
provisions,  cotton,  petroleum,  etc.  —  representing  large 
bulk  in  comparison  with  value,  and  the  imports  —  tex- 
tiles, drugs,  manufactures  of  metals,  etc. — large  value  in 
proportion  to  bulk. 

Of  the  above  estimated  aggregate  of  freights  paid  on 
the  exports  and  imports  of  the  United  States,  probably 
not  more  than  one-fifth,  or  $26,000,000  as  a  maximum, 
was  carried  under  the  American  flag.  If  the  proportions 
of  the  carrying  trade  of  the  United  States  alone,  which 
were  controlled  by  us  in  1860,  namely,  65  per  cent,  had, 
however,  been  simply  maintained,  without  any  increase, 
then  the  present  value  of  the  business  which  we  have 
allowed  to  slip  out  of  our  hands  in  this  department  of  our 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  39 

domestic  industry  must  be  valued  at  $86,000,000— $26,- 
000,000,  or  $60,000,000  per  annum. 

Adding  to  these  estimates  the  loss  of  business  conse- 
quent on  the  decline  of  ship-building  and  ship-repairing, 
and  also  the  nearly  total  loss  of  the  great  business  of 
ocean  passenger  and  immigrant  carriage,  to  be  estimated 
for  the  year  1881  at  not  less  than  $20,000,000,  and  we 
have  the  sum  of  $100,000,000  as  the  smallest  measure  in 
money  of  the  value  of  the  business  which  is  at  present 
annually  lost  to  the  country  in  the  department  of  industry 
under  consideration,  and  also  the  minimum  measure  of 
benefit  likely  to  accrue  directly  to  our  national  industry  if 
the  lost  business  could  be  at  once  regained. 

If  we  assume  $100,000,000  as  the  loss  which  the  busi- 
ness and  national  wealth  of  the  country  at  present  annually 
sustains  by  reason  of  the  decay  of  our  industries  of  ship- 
building, ship-repairing,  and  ship-using  in  foreign  com- 
merce, then  this  loss  would  be  very  nearly  equivalent  to 
all  the  capital  invested  in  all  the  blast  furnaces  of  the 
United  States  in  1880;  to  more  than  one-third  of  the 
value  of  the  present  annual  products  of  all  the  iron  and 
steel  industries  of  the  country ;  and  to  more  than  50  per 
cent  of  the  value  of  all  the  products  of  our  cotton  manu- 
facture, as  returned  by  the  census  of  1880. 

But  the  direct  losses  occasioned  by  the  decay  of  our 
ocean  commercial  marine  are  insignificant  in  comparison 
with  the  indirect  losses  due  to  the  loss  of  trade  from  an 
inability  to  make  exchanges  promptly,  regularly,  and 


4O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

cheaply,  with  foreign  countries.  No  matter  how  well 
stocked  the  store  may  be  with  good,  cheap,  and  desirable 
goods,  if  would-be  customers  find  great  inconveniences  in 
the  way  of  getting  to  the  store  and  in  transporting  to  it 
their  products  for  barter  or  exchange,  they  will  not  come, 
but  trade  elsewhere ;  more  especially  if  they  recognize  that 
some  of  the  inconveniences  in  the  way  of  their  trading 
have  been  purposely  created,  —  that  the  road  when  injured 
by  natural  causes  has  not  been  repaired,  and  that  they  are 
obliged  to  journey  to  the  store  in  wagons  when  they  can 
go  elsewhere  by  cars  with  all  modern  improvements. 

As  illustrating,  furthermore,  the  extent  to  which  the 
ocean  carrying  business  is  capable  of  development  as  a 
national  industry,  and  the  important  bearing  which  the 
returns  of  such  business  may  have  upon  the  fiscal  affairs 
of  a  great  commercial  nation,  attention  is  here  asked  to 
the  very  remarkable  results  of  an  analysis  of  the  inter- 
national carrying  trade  of  Great  Britain  from  1858  to 
1876,  inclusive,  as  made  by  one  of  the  leading  merchants 
of  Liverpool,- — A.  D.  McKay, — and  published  in  "The 
London  Economist"  for  December,  1877,  with  the  inferen- 
tial indorsement  of  that  journal.  Mr.  McKay  first  shows, 
from  the  official  figures  published  by  the  British  Board  of 
Trade,  that  the  entire  value  of  the  imports  into  Great 
Britain  —  merchandise,  specie,  and  bullion  —  for  the  nine- 
teen years  from  1858  to  1876,  was  ^5,986,000,000,  and 
that  the  value  of  all  like  exports  for  the  same  time  was 
;£4, 793,000,000;  leaving  an  excess  of  imports  over  ex- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  4! 

ports,  or  an  apparent  adverse  balance  of  trade  against 
the  United  Kingdom,  for  the  period  under  consideration, 
of  the  immense  sum  of  ^1,193,000,000,  or  nearly  $6,000,- 
000,000  ($5,965,000,000). 

Mr.  McKay  then  goes  in  to  specify  and  explain  in 
detail  the  several  items  of  charges  which  should  be  de- 
ducted from  the  above  returned  value  of  imports ;  which 
are,  first  and  largest,  the  freight  carried  by  British  vessels 
in  bringing  the  imports  into  the  country ;  second,  marine 
insurance;  third,  port  charges  —  wharfage,  cartage,  ware- 
house expenses,  and  the  like ;  fourth,  buyers'  discount ; 
fifth,  foreign  bill  stamps ;  sixth,  bankers'  commissions ; 
seventh,  commission  and  brokerage.  The  sum  thus  shown 
to  have  been  paid  for  freights  and  commercial  charges  on 
imports  amounts  to  ^518,400,000;  and  by  this  amount 
the  officially  returned  value  of  the  imports,  considered  in 
the  light  of  a  charge  against  the  Kingdom,  should  be 
properly  reduced. 

Mr.  McKay  next  gives  in  detail  the  several  items  that 
should  be  credited  to  the  returned  value  of  the  exports 
from  Great  Britain  for  the  nineteen  years  in  question,  and 
so  added  to  their  amount,  which  are  as  follows :  first, 
freight  money  paid  British  ship-owners  for  carrying 
British  exports ;  second,  insurance ;  third,  commissions ; 
fourth,  six  months  interest  on  goods  sold  for  export ;  fifth, 
profits  on  goods  exported.  These  several  credits  amount 
to  ^652,100,000;  and  by  this  sum  he  claims  the  returned 
value  of  exports  is  to  be  augmented.  Now  by  these 


42  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

charges  to  imports,  and  credits  to  exports,  aggregating 
;£ i, 1 70, 5 00,000  ($5,852,500,000),  the  apparent  adverse 
trade  balance  against  Great  Britain  from  1858  to  1876 
inclusive  is  brought  down  to  the  comparatively  small  sum 
of  ,£23,000,000 ;  or,  in  other  words,  the  exports  and  imports 
of  the  United  Kingdom,  for  a  considerable  period  of  recent 
years,  are  found  to  very  nearly  balance  one  another  as 
commercial  transactions. 

But  the  point  of  greatest  interest  and  value  brought  out 
in  this  analysis — which,  while  perhaps  open  to  criticism  in 
some  particulars,  is  undoubtedly  substantially  correct  —  is 
the  fact  that  the  earnings  of  that  portion  of  the  British 
merchant  marine  which  is  employed  in  carrying  exports 
from  and  imports  into  the  United  Kingdom,  and  the  com- 
mercial charges  incident  to  the  same,  have  amounted  for 
a  long  period  of  years  to  an  average  of  about  $300,000,000 
per  annum ;  or  a  sum  sufficient  to  keep  nearly  balanced 
the  vast  international  account  which  Great  Britain  main- 
tains, greatly  to  the  profit  of  her  labor  and  capital,  with 
all  the  world.  And  to  this  enormous  return  to  Great 
Britain  from  the  industry  of  carrying  her  own  imports 
and  exports  must  be  added  another  amount,  derived  from 
her  passenger  transport  on  the  ocean,  and  also  from  the 
earnings  of  that  portion  of  her  merchant  tonnage  em- 
ployed by  foreigners  in  an  exclusively  foreign  carrying 
trade.  How  large  a  sum  these  earnings  represent,  cannot 
be  definitely  stated ;  but  they  are  beyond  question  suffi- 
cient to  not  only  sink  the  ^23,000,000  annual  excess  of 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  43 

British  imports  over  exports  indicated  by  Mr.  McKay's 
analysis  above  given,  but  also  to  always  leave  an  immense 
balance  of  international  trade  in  favor  of  Great  Britain, 
subject  to  draft  whenever  circumstances  may  render  its 
use  expedient.  And  here  also  we  find  one,  if  not  an 
all-sufficient,  explanation  of  the  circumstance  that  when 
a  financial  and  industrial  disturbance  occurs  at  London, 
the  great  centre  of  British  trade,  its  influence  is  felt  in 
a  greater  or  less  degree  throughout  the  whole  world. 
And  yet  this  business,  in  place  of  having  touched  its 
zenith  of  development,  is  probably  only  in  its  infancy. 

Recent  statistical  inquiries,  instituted  in  Europe,  have 
led  to  the  estimate  that  the  value  of  the  commerce  of  the 
globe  for  the  year  1880  was  about  $14,405,000,000;  an 
increase  since  1850  of  240  per  cent.  Of  this  commerce 
Great  Britain  is  believed  to  control  49  per  cent ;  while  the 
toll  which  all  nations  pay  to  Great  Britain  for  the  carry- 
ing trade  which  she  performs  is  represented  "  as  equal  to 
nearly  4  per  cent  of  the  exported  value  of  the  earth's 
products  and  manufactures." 

In  fact,  with  the  exception  of  the  railway  interest,  no 
branch  of  business  has  increased  so  rapidly  within  recent 
years  as  the  ocean  carrying  trade ;  and  there  is  probably 
no  branch  of  industry  which,  in  proportion  to  the  capital 
invested,  has  been  more  profitable.  In  comparison  with 
factory  investments,  a  statement  has  recently  been  pub- 
lished, that  the  industry  employed  in  British  shipping 
returns  at  present  a  gross  equivalent  of  ^300  for  each  man 


44  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

engaged  in  it ;  while  the  corresponding  return  for  each 
British  factory  operative  is  not  in  excess  of  ^190  per 
annum.  The  circumstance  that  the  merchant  marine  of 
the  world  is  at  present  expanding  every  year  in  increased 
ratios,  is  almost  positive  proof  that  its  owners  find  such 
employment  of  their  capital  remunerative  beyond  the  aver- 
age ;  while  the  further  reported  fact  that  the  increase  in 
the  carrying  trade  of  Great  Britain  alone,  for  1881,  was 
7,764,000  tons  in  excess  of  1879,  is  also  sufficient  proof 
that  business  for  ships  is  not  wanting. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  45 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE    CAUSES     OF      THE     DECADENCE     OF      THE      AMERICAN 
MERCHANT    MARINE. 

HAVING  inquired  into  and  acquainted  ourselves  with  the 
present  condition  of  our  ocean  merchant-marine,  and  hav- 
ing traced  the  gradual  changes  which  have  taken  place  in 
our  ship-building  industry  and  foreign  carrying  trade  with- 
in the  last  quarter  of  a  century,  we  are  now  prepared  to 
enter  upon  a  discussion  and  analysis  of  the  causes  which 
have  produced  the  existing  most  remarkable  and  at  the 
same  time  nationally  discreditable  condition  of  this  de- 
partment of  the  nation's  commerce  and  industry.  How  is 
it,  that  the  United  States,  formerly  a  maritime  power  of 
the  first  class,  has  now  no  ships  or  steamers  that  can  prof- 
itably compete  for  the  carrying  of  even  its  own  exports ; 
not  merely  with  the  ships  of  our  great  commercial  rival, 
England,  but  also  with  those  of  Italy,  Sweden,  Norway, 
Germany,  Holland,  Austria,  and  Portugal  ?  And  why  is 
it  that  the  commercial  tonnage  of  nearly  every  nation 
annually  increases,  while  the  commercial  tonnage  of  the 
United  States,  including  coal-barges  and  canal-boats,  an- 
nually declines,  and  exhibits  no  symptoms  of  recupera- 
tion ?  These  are  pertinent  questions  !  They  are  questions 


46  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

which  without  solicitation  ought  to  arrest  the  attention  of 
every  citizen  of  the  United  States  who  takes  a  particle  of 
interest  in  the  affairs  of  his  country.  They  are  questions 
which  ought  to  be  agitated  and  discussed,  and  discussed 
and  agitated,  in  every  schoolhouse,  legislative  assemblage, 
and  newspaper  in  the  country,  until  some  remedial  policy 
is  agreed  upon,  and  Congress  is  forced  to  adopt  it.  And, 
in  entering  upon  the  proposed  field  of  inquiry,  it  is  desir- 
able to  first  clear  away  a  mass  of  error  and  misapprehen- 
sion which  has  accumulated  in  previous  discussions  by  the 
efforts  of  those  who  have  the  faculty  of  darkening  coun- 
sel by  "words  without  knowledge." 

What  Agencies  were  not  operative  to  occasion  Decay. 

The  facts  already  presented  fully  demonstrate  that  the 
war  was  not  the  cause,  and  did  not  mark  the  commence- 
ment, of  the  decadence  of  American  shipping ;  although 
the  contrary  is  often  and  perhaps  generally  assumed  by 
those  who  have  undertaken  to  discuss  this  subject.  The 
war  simply  hastened  a  decay  which  had  already  com- 
menced ;  and,  under  the  same  influences  and  conditions  as 
have  otherwise  prevailed,  the  same  results  which  we  now 
deplore  would  undoubtedly  have  been  reached,  even  if  no 
war  had  intervened.  Neither  can  the  paralysis  with  which 
the  great  branches  of  domestic  industry  under  considera- 
tion have  been  smitten,  and  their  even  threatened  extinc- 
tion, be  referred  to  such  agencies  as  fluctuations  of  sup- 
ply and  demand,  foreign  wars,  or  financial  revulsions  at 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  47 

home  or  abroad  ;  for  all  these  influences  have  operated  in 
the  past,  but  have  produced  no  such  results,  either  in  this 
country  or  elsewhere,  as  those  which  have  become  a  part 
of  our  recent  commercial  history.  During  the  three  years 
last  past,  the  general  prosperity  of  the  United  States, 
measured  by  the  volume  of  business  transacted  and  the 
amount  of  resulting  profits,  has  been  greater  than  ever 
before ;  and  yet  there  has  been  not  only  no  resuscitation 
of  the  American  commercial  marine,  but  rather  a  marked 
and  further  decline. 

It  was  also  a  popular  fancy  a  few  years  ago,  to  connect 
the  decadence  of  American  shipping  to  our  then  vicious, 
redundant,  and  irredeemable  currency;  and  at  a  commer- 
cial convention  held  in  Boston,  in  1868,  there  was  nothing 
in  the  speeches  made  that  commanded  more  general  assent 
and  approval  than  the  following  statement  by  a  delegate 
from  Milwaukee :  "Why,"  said  he,  "are  your  ships  rotting 
at  your  wharves  ?  It  is  because  we  are  away  from  the 
rock  bottom  on  which  the  nations  of  the  earth  transact 
business.  When  we  get  back  to  the  right  basis  we  shall 
again  have  free  commercial  intercourse  with  the  world." 
And  commenting  on  this  proposition  another  delegate  re- 
marked, "  Of  course,  with  a  redundant  and  irredeemable 
currency  we  cannot  compete  in  the  construction  of  ves- 
sels with  the  people  of  those  countries  in  which  a  specie 
standard  prevails  to  regulate  prices  and  give  stability  to 
values." 

But  our  currency  has  now  for  three  years  been  brought 


4#  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

back  to  a  specie  basis,  and  foreign  nations  in  this  respect 
have  no  longer  any  advantage  over  us  ;  and  yet  there  were 
not  half  as  many  vessels  or  half  as  much  tonnage  built  in 
the  specie  year  of  1880,  as  during  the  paper  regime  of 
1868  ;  and,  if  there  were  not  more  vessels  rotting  at  our 
wharves  in  1882  than  in  1868,  it  was  because  the  rotting 
process,  in  default  of  material  to  rot,  cannot  go  on  in- 
definitely. 

But  if  the  decadence  of  our  shipping  is  not  due  to 
domestic  or  foreign  wars,  to  financial  revulsions,  or  bad 
money,  to  what  is  the  deplorable  result  —  which  no  one 
denies  has  happened  —  to  be  attributed  ?  The  answer  first 
is,  to  not  one,  but  to  several  causes. 

The  Primary  Cause  of  the  Decay  of  our  Merchant  Marine. 

The  primary  cause  was  what  may  be  termed  a  natural 
one,  the  result  of  the  progress  of  the  age  and  a  higher 
degree  of  civilization ;  namely,  the  substitution  of  steam 
in  place  of  wind  as  an  agent  for  ship-propulsion,  and  the 
substitution  of  iron  in  the  place  of  wood  as  a  material  for 
ship-construction ;  and  for  nations  or  individuals  to  have 
attempted  to  permanently  counteract  the  influence  of  these 
substitutions  by  legislation  or  any  specific  commercial 
policy,  was  as  useless,  as  our  own  experience  proves,  as  to 
have  sought  to  arrest  the  stars  in  their  courses.  So  long 
as  wood  was  the  article  mainly  used  in  the  construction  of 
vessels,  we  had  an  advantage  over  foreign  nations  in  the 
cost  of  the  material,  in  the  skill  which  we  had  acquired  in 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  49 

working  the  same,  and  in  the  positive  genius  for  the  man- 
agement of  wooden  sailing-ships  which  natural  faculty 
and  more  than  two  centuries  of  experience  may  be  claimed 
to  have  nationally  engendered.  When,  however,  the  steam- 
engine  was  substituted  for  the  sail,  and  iron  for  wood,  then 
these  advantages  were  in  a  great  degree  neutralized  or 
wholly  swept  away. 

Steamships  adapted  to  ocean  navigation,  and  the  suc- 
cessful application  of  iron  to  the  construction  of  vessels 
designed  for  ocean  navigation,  were  accomplished  facts  in 
Great  Britain  as  early  as  1837-38.  As  is  generally  the 
case  with  all  new  inventions  and  discoveries,  these  start- 
ling innovations  on  an  old  established  order  of  things 
were  in  the  outset  regarded  doubtfully,  and,  indeed,  did 
not  command  the  full  confidence  of  the  commercial  pub- 
lic in  both  respects  until  a  considerably  later  period. 

The  application  of  steam  to  ocean  navigation  was  the 
first  to  be  accepted  as  an  absolute  necessity,  and  there- 
fore as  inevitable.  The  Americans  waited  until  English 
experience  had  proved  the  fact  to  their  full  satisfaction,  and 
then  embraced  the  idea  so  eagerly,  and  turned  it  to  prac- 
tical account  so  rapidly,  that  the  foreign  steam-tonnage  of 
the  United  States,  which  really  commenced  to  exist  in 
1848,  nearly  equalled  in  1851  (as  before  shown)  the  entire 
steam-tonnage  of  Great  Britain  of  longer  growth,  and 
continued  to  regularly  and  largely  increase  until  1856. 
But  during  the  period  between  1848  and  1855,  the  com- 
mercial public  had  become  pretty  generally  satisfied  in 


5O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

respect  to  certain  other  matters.  They  had  been  taught 
by  further  experience  that  iron  in  the  construction  of  ves- 
sels was  much  more  durable  than  wood,  and  that,  what- 
ever difference  therefore  there  might  be  in  the  first  cost, 
the  iron  vessel  in  the  long-run  is  cheaper  than  the  wooden 
one.1  They  had  learned  that  iron  vessels  are  more  rigid 
than  wooden  vessels,  and  that  the  former  are  therefore 
better  adapted  to  withstand  the  strain  of  heavy  steam- 
machinery  ;  and  also,  that  from  lack  of  the  necessary 
strength  and  rigidity  the  application  of 'the  most  econom- 
ical method  of  propulsion  —  namely,  the  screw  —  is  im- 
practicable in  the  case  of  wooden  vessels  of  large  capacity. 
They  had  also  learned  that  iron  ships  are  superior  to 
wooden  ships  in  buoyancy,  and  hence  draw  less  water  with 
a  given  tonnage,  carry  a  greater  weight  of  cargo,  and  have 
a  greater  stowage  capacity.  In  short,  they  had  come  to 
know  that  for  most  practical  purposes  the  iron  ship  was 
every  way  superior  to  the  wooden  ship ;  that  the  day  for 
the  latter  had  passed,  and  that  the  former  was  to  be  the 
vessel  of  the  future.  American  ship-owners,  merchants, 
and,  navigators,  or  at  least  the  more  enterprising  of  their 
number,  were  not  more  backward  in  learning  and  under- 
standing the  significance  of  these  facts  than  their  English 
competitors.  In  an  article  published  in  "  The  New-York 
Journal  of  Commerce,"  in  the  spring  of  1857,  nearly  four 
years  before  the  commencement  of  the  Rebellion,  Capt. 

1  However  it  may  have  been  at  the  outset,  the  original  cost  of  an  iron  ves- 
sel in  England  has  for  a  long  time  been  less  than  a  wooden  one. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  5  I 

John  Codman,*  a  practical,  clear-headed  New  England 
sailor,  fully  understanding  the  then  condition  of  affairs, 
and  foreseeing  the  inevitable  tendency  of  things  in  the 
future,  wrote  as  follows  :  — 

"  In  an  article  written  some  months  since,  it  was  assumed  that 
steam  was  destined  to  be  the  great  moving  power  for  navigation,  and 
that  it  would  supplant  almost  entirely  the  use  of  sails.  Experience  is 
every  day  justifying  this  view,  and  still  more  it  is  becoming  evident 
that  steam  will  serve  for  the  transportation  of  very  much  of  the  mer- 
chandise now  carried  by  sailing-vessels.  In  fact,  the  time  is  not  far 
distant  when  the  latter  class  of  ships  will  be  required  only  for  articles 
of  great  bulk  and  comparatively  little  value.  ' 

"  The  only  question  now  is,  Who  are  to  be  the  gainers  by  this  revo- 
lution in  navigation  ? 

"  Maintaining  then  as  now  that  the  screw  must  supersede  the  side- 
wheel  for  all  purposes,  and  that  iron  screw-steamers  are  in  all  com- 
mercial respects  preferable  to  wood  steamers,  the  argument  was  ad- 
vanced that  England,  being  able  to  construct  this  class  of  vessels 
more  economically  than  we  can,  must  of  necessity  have  the  monopoly 
of  building  them.  Her  monopoly  in  this  respect  we  cannot  prevent, 
but  it  depends  upon  ourselves  and  our  Government  whether  she  shall 
share  with  us  the  monopoly  of  owning  and  sailing  them. 

"  I  have  taken  [continues  Capt.  Codman]  a  bold  and  it  may  be 
apparently  an  unpatriotic  stand  in  assuming  that  the  only  way  in 
which  we  can  participate  in  ocean  steam-navigation  is  in  so  changing 
our  laws  that  we  may  buy  her  (English)  steamers  as  she  now  buys  our 
sailing-vessels,  because  she  finds  it  for  her  interest  so  to  do." 

Had  matters  been  allowed  to  take  their  natural  course ; 
had  Capt.  Codman's  wise  advice  —  wise  because  in  con- 
formity with  a  large  practical  experience  as  a  ship-owner 


52  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

and  ship-master  —  been  followed  in  1857;  had  Americans 
been  allowed  to  simply  take  the  advantage  of  the  world's 
progress  which  was  taken  by  their  competitors,  and  had 
not  a  subsequent  restrictive  commercial  policy  made  for- 
eign trade  to  American  merchants  almost  impossible,  —  it 
is  certain,  that,  even  in  spite  of  the  war,  there  would  have 
been  no  permanent  material  decline  in  the  American  ship- 
ping interest,  and  no  such  condition  of  things  to  bewail  as 
exists  at  present.  To  assume  to  the  contrary  is  to  assume 
that  Americans  would  have  made  an  exception  of  this  one 
department  of  their  domestic  industry,  and  have  failed  to 
bring  to  it  that  sagacity  and  skill  that  before  and  since 
have  characterized  all  their  other  business  operations. 

But  matters  were  not  allowed  to  take  their  natural 
course.  The  means  and  appliances  for  the  construction 
of  iron  vessels  did  not  then  exist  in  the  United  States ; 
while  Great  Britain,  commencing  even  as  far  back  as  1837 
(when  John  Laird  constructed  his  first  iron  steamers  of 
any  magnitude  for  steam  navigation  '),  and  with  eighteen 
years  of  experience,  had  become  thoroughly  equipped  in 
1855  for  the  prosecution  of  this  great  industry.  The 
facilities  for  the  construction  of  steam  machinery  adapted 
to  the  most  economical  propulsion  of  ocean  vessels,  fur- 
thermore, were  also  inferior  in  the  United  States  to  those 

1  The  first  iron  steamer  for  ocean  navigation  was  really  built  as  early  as 
1832,  when  the  English  firm  of  Laird  &  Co.  constructed  a  small  vessel  of 
fifty-five  tons,  which  was  designed  and  successfully  used  for  the  explora- 
tion of  the  Niger. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  53 

existing  in  Great  Britain ;  and,  by  reason  of  statute  pro- 
visions, citizens  of  the  United  States  interested  in  ocean 
commerce  were  absolutely  prevented  and  forbidden  from 
availing  themselves  of  the  results  of  British  skill  and  su- 
periority in  the  construction  of  vessels  when  such  a  re- 
course was  the  only  policy  which  could  have  enabled  them 
at  the  time  to  hold  their  position  in  the  ocean  carrying 
trade  in  competition  with  their  foreign  rivals. 

Now,  there  is  very  little  of  sentimentality  in  respect  to 
business  matters  among  the  representatives  of  trade  and 
commerce,  whatever  may  be  their  nationality.  They  sim- 
ply ask,  "Who  will  serve  us  best  and  at  the  cheapest 
rate  ? "  And,  the  inability  of  the  ships  of  the  United 
States  to  do  the  work  which  trade  and  commerce  required 
that  they  should  do  as  well  and  cheaply  as  the  ships  of 
other  nations  having  been  demonstrated  by  experience, 
the  decadence  of  American  shipping  commenced  and  was 
inevitable  from  the  very  hour  when  this  fact  was  first  rec- 
ognized, which  was  about  the  year  1856. 

Here,  then,  we  have  the  primary  cause  of  the  decay  of 
business  of  ship-building  in  the  United  States  and  of  our 
commercial  marine.  Other  causes  —  to  be  hereafter 
noted  —  have  since  come  in  and  helped  the  decay,  and  arc 
powerfully  operative  to  prevent  recovery ;  but  so  long  as 
the  conditions,  which  in  the  outset  were  the  source  of  the 
trouble,  continue  to  prevail,  decay  will  continue  to  go  on, 
and  there  can  be  no  recovery. 

Attention  should  here  be  called  to  the  circumstance 


54  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

that  the  relation  of  the  United  States  to  Great  Britain  in 
this  matter  of  ship  construction  and  employment  has  been 
no  different,  from  the  very  outset  of  the  new  era  in  navi- 
gation, than  that  of  all  other  maritime  nations ;  with  the 
single  exception,  that,  as  the  interest  of  the  United  States 
in  the  new  conditions  was  greater  than  that  of  all  these 
others  combined,  it  was  incumbent  on  the  former  to  act 
with  the  greatest  wisdom  and  discretion,  and  not  allow 
prejudice  and  ancient  conservatism  to  prevent  the  remov- 
al of  obstacles  which  stood  in  the  way  of  national  growth 
and  development.  But  none  of  these  nations,  with  the 
possible  exception  of  old  Spain,  acted  as  did  the  United 
States.  Taking  a  practical,  common-sense  view  of  the 
situation,  and  setting  sentiment  aside,  they  concluded  that 
it  would  be  the  height  of  folly  to  permit  a  great  and  prof- 
itable department  of  their  industries  to  be  impaired  or 
destroyed,  rather  than  allow  certain  improvements  in  the 
management  of  its  details,  because  suggested  and  carried 
out  by  a  foreign  nation,  to  be  purchased  and  adopted. 
And  they  therefore  virtually  said  to  their  own  people, 
"Go  to,  now!  If  England  can  build  better  and  cheaper 
ships  for  ocean  commerce  than  you  can  yourselves,  and 
will  furnish  them  to  you  on  terms  as  favorable  in  every 
respect  as  is  granted  to  her  own  citizens,  and  if  your  own 
private  judgment  and  feeling  of  self-interest  prompt  you 
to  buy  and  use  such  ships,  the  state  will  interpose  no  ob- 
stacles to  your  so  doing.  Furthermore,  as  between  a  busi- 
ness and  the  instrumentalities  for  doing  business,  we  hold 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  55 

that  the  interests  of  the  first  are  to  be  first  considered : 
for,  if  the  business  fails,  the  instrumentalities  employed  in 
it,  be  they  good  or  bad,  will  retain  but  little  of  value; 
whereas,  on  the  other  hand,  if  the  business  can  be  kept 
profitable  there  need  be  no  apprehension  as  to  a  deficiency 
or  imperfection  of  the  instrumentalities." 

And  the  merchants  and  capitalists  of  these  maritime 
states,  adopting  the  course  which  seemed  best  to  them  un- 
der the  circumstances,  went  to  England  and  supplied  them- 
selves with  ships  and  steamers  of  the  most  approved 
patterns,  and,  sharing  with  the  English  the  monopoly  of 
owning  and  using  the  same,  have  always  derived  great  profit 
therefrom.  And  the  several  states,  furthermore,  which 
permitted  their  citizens  to  act  without  restraint  in  accord- 
ance with  their  own  best  judgment  in  this  matter,  have 
never  had  any  such  results  as  the  United  States  has  experi- 
enced, but,  on  the  contrary,  have  seen  their  commercial 
tonnage  and  carrying  trade  upon  the  high  seas  largely  in- 
crease ;  and,  if  their  shipping  interests  have  since  experi- 
enced any  vicissitudes,  they  have  not  in  any  one  instance 
been  referred  to  influences  even  remotely  connected  with 
the  liberal  policy  that  was  adopted. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  policy  of  the  United  States 
under  the  same  circumstances  has  been  very  much  as  if, 
at  the  outset  of  the  development  of  the  railway  system  as 
an  improved  method  of  transporting  goods  and  passengers, 
some  one  State  of  the  Union  —  say  Ohio,  for  example  — 
had  said,  "We  have  no  manufactories  of  locomotives  or 


56  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

cars,  or  mills  for  rolling  railway-bars,  within  our  territory ; 
State  pride,  and  a  desire  to  be  wholly  independent,  will  not 
allow  us  to  purchase  these  articles  of  Pennsylvania :  there- 
fore we  will  continue  to  use  horses  and  wagons,  which 
heretofore  have  answered  our  purposes  of  transportation, 
and  not  use  railroads  until  we  can  manufacture  all  railroad 
equipments  ourselves."  People  in  other  States  would 
have  been  prompted  to  call  the  people  of  Ohio  fools  and 
stupids,  and  perhaps  have  prefixed  to  these  terms  of 
reproach  and  contempt  certain  irreverent  and  forcible 
expletives  to  add  force  to  their  expressions  of  sentiment ; 
and  yet  the  boundary-line  which  separates  the  United 
States  from  Great  Britain  is  just  as  much  a  matter  of 
artificial  ordination  as  that  which  separates  Ohio  from 
Pennsylvania.  But,  be  this  as  it  may,,  the  result  in  the 
hypothetical  case  would  have  been  exactly  the  same  as  is 
the  result  in  the  real  case.  Ohio  would  not  have  got  her 
railroads,  nor  the  wealth  and  development  that  would  have 
flowed  from  their  construction  ;  and  the  United  States  has 
not  got  the  ships,  or  the  wealth  and  business  that  have 
been  attendant  upon  their  possession  and  skilful  employ- 
ment in  other  countries. 

The  question  which  next  naturally  presents  itself  in  the 
order  of  this  inquiry  and  discussion  is,  Why  is  it  that  the 
people  of  the  United  States  have  not  been  permitted  to 
enjoy  the  privileges  accorded  to  other  maritime  nations, 
of  adjusting  their  shipping  interests  to  the  spirit  and 
wants  of  the  age  ?  Why  have  they  alone  been  debarred 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  57 

from  using  the  best  tools  in  an  important  department  of 
commerce,  when  the  using  meant  business  retained,  labor 
employed,  and  capital  rewarded,  and  the  non-using  equally 
meant  decay,  paralysis,  and  impoverishment  ?  The  answer 
is,  Because  of  our  so-called  navigation  laws.  Let  us, 
therefore,  at  this  point  consider  the  nature  and  influence 
of  this  famous  code,  which  in  a  great  degree  has  deter- 
mined our  commercial  policy  as  a  nation,  and  learn  how  it 
originated  and  why  it  has  been  perpetuated. 


58  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

OUR   NAVIGATION   LAWS,  AND    HOW   THEY   ORIGINATED. 

WHEN  the  convention  that  framed  the  Federal  Con- 
stitution came  together  in  1787,  there  were  two  sectional 
questions  of  importance  that  came  before  it,  and  two  only, 
—  the  question  of  slavery  and  the  regulation  of  commerce. 
The  extreme  Southern  States  wanted  slavery  and  the 
slave-trade  legalized  and  protected.  The  South,  as  a 
whole,  also  favored  free  trade.  New  England,  on  the 
other  hand,  largely  interested  in  shipping,  a  not  insignifi- 
cant proportion  of  which,  either  directly  or  indirectly,  was 
engaged  in  the  slave-trade  (her  people,  Massachusetts  men 
especially,  importing  molasses  from  the  West  Indies,  dis- 
tilling it  into  rum,  using  the  rum  to  buy  slaves  on  the 
coast  of  Africa,  and  selling  the  slaves  at  the  South),  de- 
sired, through  a  system  of  navigation  laws,  to  hold  a 
monopoly  of  the  commerce  of  the  new  nation;  while  the 
Middle  States  generally  wanted  neither  slavery  nor  navi- 
gation laws.  The  sentiment  of  the  country  as  a  whole  at 
this  period  was  averse  to  slavery ;  and  the  cultivation  of 
cotton  not  having  then  been  introduced  to  any  consider- 
able extent  into  the  Southern  States,  or  made  the  source 
of  profit  that  it  subsequently  became  through  the  inven- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE,  59 

tion  of  the  cotton-gin,  the  anti-slavery  feeling  had  developed 
itself  much  more  strongly  in  some  parts  of  the  South 
than  it  had  in  New  England.1  So  that,  if  New  England 

1  "  The  sentiment  was  common  to  Virginia,  at  least  among  the  intelligent 
and  educated,  that  slavery  was  cruel  and  unjust.  The  delegates  from  Vir- 
ginia and  Maryland,  hostile  to  navigation  laws,  were  still  more  warmly 
opposed  to  the  African  slave-trade.  Delaware  by  her  constitution,  and  Vir- 
ginia and  Maryland  by  special  laws,  had  prohibited  the  importation  of  slaves. 
North  Carolina  had  shown  a  disposition  to  conform  to  the  policy  of  her 
Northern  sisters  by  an  act  which  denounced  the  further  introduction  of  slaves 
into  the  State  as  'highly  impolitic.'"  (Hildreth,  vol.  iii.,  pp.  508-510.) 
Pennsylvania  founded  a  society  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  1775,  with 
Franklin  for  its  first  president,  and  Rush  its  first  secretary.  New  York  had 
a  similar  society  in  1785,  with  Jay  as  its  first  president  and  Hamilton  as  his 
successor.  On  the  other  hand,  as  some  illustration  of  the  then  current  New 
England  sentiment,  attention  is  asked  to  the  following  extract  from  an  ora- 
tion by  Mr.  David  Daggett  (afterwards  United  States  Senator  and  Chief- 
Justice  of  Connecticut)  at  New  Haven,  July  4,  1787,  a  month  before  the 
Federal  Convention,  then  in  session,  took  up  the  subject  of  slavery  and  the 
navigation  laws.  The  orator,  after  speaking  of  the  gratitude  and  generous 
reward  the  country  owed  to  the  officers  and  soldiers  of  the  late  army,  and 
its  immediate  inability  to  discharge  such  obligations,  continued, — 

"  If,  however,  there  is  not  a  sufficiency  of  property  in  the  country,  I  would 
project  a  plan  to  acquire  it.  ...  Let  us  repeal  all  the  laws  against  the 
African  slave-trade,  and  undertake  the  truly  benevolent  and  humane  mer- 
chandise of  importing  negroes  to  Christianize  them.  This  has  been  practised 
by  individuals  among  us,  and  they  have  found  it  a  lucrative  branch  of  busi- 
ness. Let  us,  then,  make  a  national  matter  of  it.  ...  We  should  have  the 
sublime  satisfaction  of  enriching  ourselves,  and  at  the  same  time  rendering 
happy,  thousands  of  those  blacks,  by  instructing  them  in  the  ways  of  religion. 
.  .  .  This  would  be  no  innovation.  .  .  .  This  country  permitted  it  for  many 
years,  among  their  other  acts  of  justice  ;  but  their  refusing  to  pay  sacred  and 
solemn  obligations  is  not  so  long  standing." 


6O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

had  been  as  true  to  the  great  principles  of  liberty  as  her 
people  were  always  professing,  it  seems  probable  that, 
aided  by  the  Middle  States,  and  in  part  by  the  South,  she 
might  have  brought  about  an  arrangement  under  the  Fed- 
eral Constitution,  at  the  time  of  its  formation,  for  the 
gradual  but  no  very  remote  extinction  of  American  slave- 
ry and  an  avoidance  of  the  expenditure  of  blood  and 
treasure  which  has  since  been  entailed  by  its  continuance. 
Selfishness  and  the  love  of  the  dollar,  however,  proved  as 
omnipotent  then  as  they  ever  have,  and  the  result  was  a 
compromise  of  iniquity ;  the  power  to  regulate  commerce 
being  inserted  in  the  Constitution,  together  with  and  as  a 
consideration  for  the  extension  by  New  England  votes  of 
the  slave-trade  until  1808  and  the  prohibition  of  export 
duties. 

A  Curious  Chapter  of  our  National  History. 

This  curious  chapter  in  our  national  history,  although 
familiar  to  historical  students,  has  been  all  but  unknown 
to  the  mass  of  the  American  people.  The  evidence  of  its 
truth  is,  however,  complete.  The  fourth  section  of  the 
Seventh  Article  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States, 
as  originally  reported  by  the  Committee  of  Detail,  pro- 
vided that  "  no  tax  or  duty  shall  be  laid  by  the  Legisla- 
ture on  articles  exported  from  any  State,  nor  on  the  migra- 
tion or  importation  of  such  persons  as  the  several  States 
shall  think  proper  to  admit ;  nor  shall  such  migration  or 
importation  be  prohibited."  When  the  convention  came 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  6l 

to  the  consideration  of  this  section,  they  amended  it  by 
making  the  prohibition  of  the  imposition  of  duties  on  ex- 
ports general,  or  applicable  to  the  Federal  Government  as 
well  as  to  the  States ;  although  Mr.  Madison  tried  to  have 
the  power  to,  do  so  allowed  to  Congress  when  two-thirds 
of  each  House  should  vote  its  expediency.  The  question 
next  occurred  on  the  residue  of  the  section,  which  Mr. 
Luther  Martin,  of  Maryland,  moved  to  amend  so  as  to 
authorize  Congress  to  lay  a  tax  or  prohibition  at  its  dis- 
cretion upon  the  importation  of  slaves.  The  provision  as 
it  stood  in  the  report  of  the  committee  would,  he  said, 
give  encouragement  to  the  slave-trade ;  and  he  held  it 
"  inconsistent  with  the  principles  of  the  Revolution,  and 
dishonorable  to  American  character,  to  have  such  a  feature 
in  the  Constitution."  Messrs.  Rutledge  and  Pinckney,  the 
South  Carolina  delegates,  and  Mr.  Baldwin  of  Georgia, 
warmly  protested  against  Mr.  Martin's  proposition  as  an 
uncalled-for  interference  with  the  slave-trade.  Mr.  Ells- 
worth and  Mr.  Sherman,  of  Connecticut,  were  both  for 
leaving  the  clause  as  reported.  "  Let  every  State,"  they 
said,  "import  what  they  please."  Elbridge  Gerry,  of 
Massachusetts,  "acquiesced,  with  some  reserve,"  in  the 
complying  policy  of  the  delegates  of  Connecticut ;  while 
his  colleague,  Rufus  King,  "  made  a  measured  resistance  " 
merely  on  the  grounds  of  State  expediency.  George 
Mason,  of  Virginia,  expressed  himself  with  great  energy 
in  opposition  to  the  views  of  the  delegates  from  Connecti- 
cut. "  This  infernal  traffic,"  he  said,  "  originated  in  the 


62  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

avarice  of  British  merchants ;  "  and  "  he  lamented  that 
some  of  our  Eastern  brethren  had,  from  lust  of  gain,  em- 
barked in  this  nefarious  traffic."  In  this  state  of  things 
Gouverneur  Morris  arose,  and  after  adverting  to  the  cir- 
cumstance that  the  sixth  section  of  the  same  Article  of 
the  Constitution  under  consideration  contained  a  provision 
that  no  navigation  laws  should  be  enacted  without  the 
consent  of  two-thirds  of  each  branch  of  Congress,  and 
that  this  provision  particularly  concerned  the  interests  of 
the  New  England  States,  proposed  that  this  section, 
together  with  the  fourth  section  (relating  to  the  slave- 
trade)  and  the  fifth  section  (relating  to  the  assessment  of 
a  capitation  tax  on  slaves),  be  referred  to  a  special  com-, 
mittee ;  remarking  at  the  same  time  (see  Rives's  "  Life 
and  Times  of  Madison,"  vol.  ii.,  pp.  444,- 450),  "that  these 
things  may  form  a  bargain  among  the  Northern  and 
Southern  States." 

The  hint  thus  given  was  not  thrown  away.  All  these 
matters  were  referred  to  a  committee ;  and  what  this 
committee  did  is  thus  told  by  Luther  Martin,  one  of  its 
members,  in  a  letter  to  the  Speaker  of  the  Maryland 
House  of  Delegates  :  — 

"  I  found  the  Eastern  States,  notwithstanding  their  aversion  to 
slavery,  were  very  willing  to  indulge  the  Southern  States  at  least  with 
a  temporary  liberty  to  prosecute  the  slave-trade,  provided  the  Southern 
States  would  in  turn  gratify  them  by  laying  no  restriction  on  [the 
enactment  of  ]  navigation  acts;  and  after  a  little  time  the  committee 
agreed  on  a  report  by  which  the  General  Government  was  to  be  pro- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  63 

hibited  from  preventing  the  importation  of  slaves  for  a  limited  time, 
and  the  restrictive  clause  relative  to  navigation  acts  was  to  be 
omitted."  (Elliott's  "  Debates,"  second  edition,  vol.  i.,  p.  373.) 


The  limit  of  time  for  the  extension  of  the  slave-trade 
agreed  to  by  the  committee  in  making  the  bargain  was 
1800;  but  when  the  report  came  before  the  Convention, 
Mr.  Pinckney  of  South  Carolina  moved  to  amend  by 
substituting  1808  in  lieu  of  1800,  as  the  term  of  the 
permitted  traffic  ;  and  this  motion  was  seconded  by  Mr. 
Gorham  of  Massachusetts.  Mr.  Madison  and  others  ear- 
nestly opposed  this  amendment ;  "  but  the  coalition  that 
had  taken  place  rendered  all  remonstrance  vain,  and  Gen. 
Pinckney's  motion  was  carried  in  the  affirmative ;  all  of 
the  three  New  England  States,  with  South  Carolina, 
Georgia,  Maryland,  and  North  Carolina,  voting  for  it,  and 
Virginia,  Pennsylvania,  New  Jersey,  and  Delaware  voting 
against  it."  Four  days  later  the  residue  of  the  report, 
recommending  that  the  sixth  section,  which  imposed 
restrictions  against  the  passage  of  Congress  of  a  naviga- 
tion act  be  omitted,  was  taken  up  and  earnestly  debated, 
and  opposed  by  George  Mason,  Gov.  Randolph,  and 
others,  but  as  earnestly  advocated  by  Pinckney  and  Butler 
of  South  Carolina,  "who  earnestly  invoked  a  spirit  of 
conciliation  towards  the  Eastern  States  on  account  of 
the  liberality  they  had  shown  to  the  wishes  of  the  two 
southernmost  States  with  regard  to  the  importation  of 
slaves ; "  and,  finally,  "  the  bargain  that  had  been  entered 


64  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

into,  oy  which  the  legalization  of  the  slave-trade  for 
twenty  years  on  the  one  side  was  the  price  of  the  aban- 
donment of  restrictions  on  the  passage  by  Congress  of  a 
navigation  act"  on  the  other,  received  its  final  ratification. 
(Rives's  "  Life  and  Times  of  Madison.") 

The  language  of  Hildreth  in  concluding  his  historical 
account  of  this  matter  is  also  to  the  same  effect,  and  is  as 
follows  :  "  Thus  by  an  understanding,  or,  as  Gouverneur 
Morris  called  it,  '  a  bargain,'  between  the  commercial  rep- 
resentatives of  the  Northern  States  and  the  delegates  of 
South  Carolina  and  Georgia,  and  in  spite  of  the  opposi- 
tion of  Maryland  and  Virginia,  the  unrestricted  power  of 
Congress  to  enact  navigation  laws  was  conceded  to  the 
Northern  merchants,  and  to  the  Carolina  rice-planters,  as 
an  equivalent,  twenty  years'  continuance  of  the  African 
slave-trade."  (Hildreth's  "United  States,"  vol.  iii.,  p.  520.) 

"This  transaction,"  continues  Mr.  Rives,  "undoubtedly 
made  a  most  disagreeable  impression  on  the  minds  of 
many  members  of  the  convention,  and  seemed  at  once  to 
convert  the  feeling  of  partial  dissatisfaction,  that  had  al- 
ready been  excited  in  certain  quarters  by  one  or  two  votes 
of  the  convention,  into  a  sentiment  of  incurable  alienation 
and  disgust.  Gov.  Randolph,  a  few  days  after  the  first 
part  of  the  bargain  had  been  ratified,  and  while  the 
latter  part  was  pending,  declared  that  'there  were  features 
so  odious  in  the  Constitution,  as  it  now  stands,  that  he 
doubted  whether  he  should  be  able  to  agree  to  it.'  Col. 
Mason,  two  days  later,  declared  that  '  he  would  sooner 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  65 

chop  off  his  right  hand  than  put  it  to  the  Constitution  as 
it  now  stands.'"  And  the  names  of  neither  of  these  del- 
egates appear  on  the  roll  of  delegates  to  the  national  con- 
vention who  subsequently  signed  the  Constitution. 

Ratification  of  the  Contract. 

When  the  Federal  Congress  assembled  for  the  first  time 
under  the  Constitution,  New  England  was  not  dilatory  in 
demanding  the  fulfilment  of  her  part  of  this  disreputable 
compact;  and  in  1790  and  1792  the  foundation  of  our 
present  navigation  laws  was  laid,  in  acts  levying  tonnage 
dues  and  impost  taxes,  which  discriminated  to  such  an 
extent  against  foreign  shipping  as  to  practically  give  to 
American  ship-owners  a  nearly  complete  monopoly  of  all 
American  commerce.  By  the  act  of  1790,  a  tonnage  tax 
of  thirty  cents  per  ton  was  levied  on  all  American  vessels, 
and  fifty  cents  per  ton  on  the  vessels  of  powers  not  in 
alliance  with  the  United  States.  Duties  in  the  ordinary 
form  on  imports  were  also  imposed,  but  a  remission  of  ten 
per  cent  of  all  such  duties  was  provided  in  case  the  goods 
were  imported  in  American  vessels. 

These  discriminating  measures  were  provisionally  re- 
pealed by  the  treaty  of  peace  between  the  United  States 
and  Great  Britain  in  1815:  but,  no  disposition  having 
been  subsequently  manifested  by  Great  Britain  and  other 
foreign  powers  to  enact  reciprocal  legislation,  the  repeal- 
ing acts  were  never  carried  into  effect ;  but  on  the  con- 
trary, in  1816,  1817,  and  1820,  Congress  enacted  a  system 


66  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

of  navigation  laws  which  were  avowedly  modelled  on  the 
very  statutes  of  Great  Britain  which  the  Americans,  as 
colonists,  had  found  so  oppressive  that  they  constituted 
one  prime  cause  of  their  rebellion  against  the  mother 
country,  the  main  features  of  difference  between  the  two 
systems  being  that  wherever  it  was  possible  to  make  the 
American  laws  more  rigorous  and  arbitrary  than  the  Brit- 
ish model,  the  opportunity  was  not  neglected.  And  these 
laws,  without  material  change,  hold  their  place  to-day 
upon  our  national  statute-book.  International  trade  since 
their  enactment  has  come  to  be  carried  on  by  entirely  dif- 
ferent methods.  Ships  are  different,  voyages  are  different, 
crews  are  different,  men's  habits  of  thought  and  methods 
of  doing  business  are  different :  but  the  old,  mean  arbi- 
trary laws  which  the  last  century  devised  to  shackle  com- 
merce remain  unchanged  in  the  United  States,  alone  of 
all  the  nations  ;  and,  what  is  most  singular  of  all,  it  is 
claimed  to  be  the  part  of  wisdom  and  the  evidence  of 
patriotism  to  uphold  and  defend  them. 

As  a  further  and  essential  part  of  the  history  of  this 
legislation,  and  as  some  extenuation  of  the  illiberal  policy 
of  the  first  Congress,  it  should  be  here  stated  that  public 
sentiment  in  the  United  States  in  respect  to  the  policy  of 
the  enactment  of  navigation  laws,  and  of  making  them 
harshly  discriminative  against  the  shipping  of  foreign 
nations,  experienced  a  marked  change  between  the  time 
when  the  power  to  regulate  commerce  was  made  by  the 
convention  a  part  of  the  Federal  Constitution,  and  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  67 

time  when  the  enactment  of  discriminating  tonnage  dues 
and  tariff  taxes  came  up  for  consideration,  in  1790  and 
1792,  in  the  Federal  Congress.  This  was  due  mainly  to 
the  utter  failure  on  the  part  of  the  American  Government 
(confederative  and  constitutional)  to  induce  Great  Britain 
to  recede  in  any  degree  from  the  extremely  illiberal  com- 
mercial policy  which  she  had  adopted  towards  her  former 
colonies  since  the  attainment  of  their  independence.  Pre- 
viously they  could  trade  freely  with  the  other  British  pos- 
sessions in  America,  and  the  West  Indies,  exchanging 
lumber,  corn,  fish,  and  other  provisions,  together  with 
horses  and  cattle,  for  sugar,  molasses,  coffee,  and  rum  ; 
but  immediately  upon  the  conclusion  of  the  war  the  peo- 
ple of  the  new  nation  were  put  on  the  same  footing  as 
other  foreign  countries,  and  under  the  operations  of  the 
British  navigation  laws  were,  in  common  with  them,  ex- 
cluded from  nearly  all  participation  in  an  extensive  and 
flourishing  part  of  their  former  maritime  commerce.  And 
as  illustrating  the  then  temper  of  the  times,  and  the  illib- 
eral spirit  that  then  pervaded  the  counsels  of  nations,  it 
may  be  mentioned,  that  this  policy  was  persevered  in  by 
Great  Britain,  even  after  it  was  proved  in  repeated  in- 
stances to  work  most  injuriously  to  her  own  home  inter- 
ests, and  to  have  occasioned  great  suffering  upon  her 
West-Indian  colonies.  Thus,  between  1780  and  1787,  no 
less  than  15,000  slaves  were  known  to  have  perished  from 
starvation  in  the  British  West-Indies,  by  reason  of  inabil- 
ity, through  the  operation  of  the  British  navigation  laws,  to 


68  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

obtain  the  requisite  supplies  of  food  from  the  North  Ameri- 
cans at  a  period  when  the  home-grown  portion  of  their 
substance  had  been  destroyed  by  successive  hurricanes. 
William  Pitt,  however,  was  a  man  capable  of  rising  above 
the  ordinary  level  of  his  times  and  political  surroundings, 
and,  foreseeing  the  serious  difficulties  of  the  situation, 
desired,  as  chancellor  of  the  exchequer,  immediately  after 
the  close  of  the  war,  to  deal  liberally  with  the  new  nation  ; 
and  accordingly,  as  early  as  1783,  introduced  into  Parlia- 
ment a  bill  allowing  comparatively  free  commerce  between 
the  United  States  and  the  British  colonies,  —  more  espe- 
cially with  the  West  Indies.  But  the  measure,  owing  pri- 
marily to  the  resignation  of  the  ministry,  and  to  the 
strong  opposition  of  the  British  shipping  interests,  aided 
by  the  efforts  of  the  loyalists  of  the' remaining  British 
North  American  colonies,  was  not  only  defeated,  but  in 
1788  an  act  was  passed  absolutely  forbidding  the  importa- 
tion of  any  American  produce  into  any  British  colony, 
except  in  British  bottoms.  And  these  restrictions  on  the 
participation  of  the  United  States  in  British  colonial  trade 
very  singularly  remained  unrepealed  until  1830,  in  which 
year  a  British  order  in  council  was  adopted  authorizing 
vessels  of  the  United  States  to  import  into  the  British 
possessions  abroad  any  of  their  domestic  produce,  and  to 
export  goods  from  the  same  to  any  foreign  countries 
whatever. 

And,  as  some  further  evidence  of  the  British  jealousy 
of  the  commercial  competition  of  the  United  States  during 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  69 

% 

the  decade  between  1783  and  1793,  it  may  be  mentioned 
that  Lord  Sheffield,  who  headed  the  opposition  to  Mr.  Pitt's 
bill  (above  noticed),  published  in  1783  a  book  in  which  he 
advised  the  British  Government  not  to  interfere  too  exten- 
sively with  the  Barbary  pirates,  on  the  ground,  that,  through 
lack  of  any  sufficient  naval  force  on  the  part  of  the 
United  States  to  restrain  and  punish, — but  which  force 
Great  Britain  was  known  to  possess,  —  the  operations  of 
the  corsairs  would  be  confined  mainly  to  the  destruction 
of  American  commerce  and  of  the  little  states  of  Italy, 
whereby  British  commerce  would  be  benefited.1 

Under  such  circumstances  it  was  but  natural  that  the 

1  The  nature  of  the  opinions  respecting  the  commercial  future  of  the 
United  States,  entertained  after  the  termination  of  the  war  by  not  a  few  intel- 
ligent and  influential  Englishmen,  is  curiously  illustrated  by  the  following 
extract  from  the  book  of  Lord  Sheffield,  above  noticed,  which,  published 
originally  about  1783  under  the  title,  "  Observations  on  the  Commerce  of  the 
American  States,"  appears  to  have  attracted  much  attention  in  England,  and 
to  have  passed  through  at  least  two  editions.  "  The  Americans,"  he  says, 
"  cannot  protect  themselves  [from  the  Barbary  States] ;  they  cannot  pretend 
to  a  navy.  In  war  New  England  may  have  privateers,  but  they  will  be  few 
indeed  if  we  do  not  give  up  the  Navigation  Act.  The  best  informed  say  not 
less  than  three-fourths  of  the  crews  of  the  American  privateers  during  the 
late  war  were  Europeans.  It  has  been  shown  that  America  has  not  many 
sailors,  and  they  are  not  likely  to  increase  if  we  are  prudent ;  and  when  Irish- 
men learn  to  employ  themselves  better  than  in  fighting  the  battles  of  the 
Americans,  by  sea  as  well  as  by  land,  the  character  of  the  latter  will  not  in 
general  be  very  martial :  their  condition,  state,  circumstances,  intents,  must 
prevent.  It  is  remarkable  how  few  good  harbors  there  are  for  large  ships-of- 
war  in  the  American  States  south  of  Cape  Cod ;  at  least,  we  have  found  none 
except  at  Rhode  Island :  and,  if  a  navy  could  be  afforded,  there  would  be 


70  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

representatives  of  the  nation  came  together  in  Congress  in 
1791-92  with  very  different  sentiments  in  respect  to  policy 
of  navigation  laws  from  those  entertained  by  the  members 
of  the  Federal  Convention  in  1787.  It  was  felt  by  the  for- 
mer, and  by  the  whole  nation,  that  the  legislation  of  Great 
Britain  —  especially  that  part  of  it  which  broke  up  the 
then  important  trade  of  the  United  States  with  the  Brit- 
ish West  Indies  —  was  designedly  hostile  legislation, 
which  could  only  be  properly  met,  and  its  continuance 
prevented,  by  retaliatory  legislation.  And  Congress  in 
1790-92  accordingly  did  retaliate;  and  a  quarter  of  a 
century  later  (1816-1820),  after  another  war,  when  Great 

as  much  difficulty  in  agreeing  that  so  essential  an  establishment  should  be  at 
Rhode  Island  as  there  would  be  in  removing  the  Dutch  Admiralty  from 
Amsterdam.  To  the  southward  of  the  Bay  of  Fundy  there  is  not  flow  of 
tide  sufficient  to  enable  the  Americans  to  have  a  dry-dock  for  ships  of  the 
line.  The  want  of  durability  in  their  timber  would  alone  make  a  navy  most 
expensive  to  them.  A  country  which  has  such  opportunity  of  farming  cannot 
be  supposed  to  support  many  seamen.  There  is  not  a  possibility  of  her 
maintaining  a  navy.  That  country,  concerning  which  writers  of  lively  imagi- 
nations have  lately  said  so  much,  is  weakness  itself.  Exclusive  of  its  poverty 
and  want  of  resources,  having  lost  all  credit,  its  independent  government, 
discordant  interests,  and  the  great  improbability  of  acting  again  together, 
the  circumstance  alone  of  such  a  vast  country,  with  a  third  less  of  people 
than  that  small  spot  in  Europe  inhabited  by  the  Dutch,  are  incompatible 
with  strength.  Her  population  is  not  likely  to  increase  as  it  has  done,  at 
least  on  her  coast.  On  the  contrary,  the  present  inhabitants  are  likely  to 
fall  back  on  the  interior  country  to  get  better  land,  and  avoid  taxes ;  and 
that  they  may  in  some  future  ages  become  numerous  as  a  country  of  farmers, 
without  markets,  can  be  expected;  but  the  settlers  beyond  the  Alleghany 
Mountains  cannot  become  commercial." 


OUR  MERC  PI  ANT  MARINE.  Jl 

Britain  refused  to  accept  the  offer  on  the  part  of  the 
United  States  of  a  more  liberal  reciprocal  commercial 
policy,  it  enacted  navigation  laws  even  more  stringent 
than  any  which  had  before  found  a  place  upon  our  statute- 
books. 

To  further  complete  this  record,  it  should  be  also  here 
noted,  that,  in  connection  with  the  restriction  of  commerce 
by  the  enactment  of  navigation  laws  in  the  first  Congress, 
the  first  selfish  and  sectional  antagonism  of  the  States,  in 
respect  to  the  adjustment  of  duties  on  foreign  imports, 
also  occurred.  Thus  "  the  South "  (we  quote  from  Pro- 
fessor Sumner's  "  History  of  Protection  in  the  United 
States")  "wanted  a  protective  duty  on  hemp,  claiming 
that  rice  and  indigo  were  unprofitable.  Pennsylvania 
opposed  any  tax  on  hemp  as  a  raw  material  of  cordage, 
but  wanted  a  tax  on  that.  New  England  opposed  the  tax 
on  cordage  as  a  raw  material  of  ships,  but  wanted  protec- 
tion on  the  latter."  The  most  strenuous  contention  was, 
however,  in  respect  to  rum  and  molasses.  "  The  South, 
except  Georgia,  wanted  a  high  tariff  on  rum  for  revenue. 
The  Middle  States  wanted  it  in  the  interests  of  temper- 
ance; the  Eastern  States,  for  protection  to  their  rum- 
distilleries.  Georgia  opposed  this  tax  because  she  used  a 
great  deal  of  rum,  and  bought  it  in  the  West  Indies  with 
her  lumber.  The  Southern  and  Middle  States  wanted  a 
tax  also  on  molasses,  but  this  the  Eastern  States  vigor- 
ously opposed.  Molasses  was  the  raw  material  of  rum." 
It  was  bought  with  salt  fish,  lumber,  and  staves  sent  to 


72  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  West  Indies,  distilled  into  rum  in  New  England,  which 
was  sent  as  export  to  Africa  to  buy  slaves,  and  these  in 
turn  were  sold  to  the  South.  And  now,  after  having 
bartered  their  souls  by  extending  the  horrors  of  the 
slave-trade  for  twenty  long  years  in  consideration  of  a 
monopoly  of  shipping,  was  New  England  to  permit  the 
most  profitable  element  of  that  monopoly  to  be  at  once 
taken  away  from  them  ?  Not  if  their  representatives 
could  prevent  it !  We  are  accustomed  to  look  back  upon 
the  representatives  that  sat  in  the  first  Congress,  espe- 
cially those  sent  from  New  England,  as  men  infinitely 
removed  from  base  and  sordid  motives,  whose  like  it  is 
never  to  be  vouchsafed  to  us  to  see  again  in  public  office. 
But,  when  one  comes  to  look  over  the  debates  that  took 
place  in  the  first  Congress  on  the  rum  and  molasses  ques- 
tion, he  cannot  help  fancying  that  he  is  in  the  Federal 
House  of  Representatives  at  the  present  day,  and  that  a 
debate  on  the  tariff  is  in  progress. 

The  duty  which  it  was  proposed  to  assess  on  molasses 
was  six  cents  a  gallon,  —  a  fourth  of  a  cent  less  than 
molasses  pays  under  the  existing  tariff  (1882)  ;  and  the 
delegation  from  Massachusetts,  it  is  recorded,  "occupied 
the  time  of  the  House  for  several  days  with  vehement 
remonstrances  against  it."  One  member,  Mr.  Thurber, 
went  so  far  as  to  intimate  that  the  people  of  his  State 
"  will  hardly  bear  a  tax  which  they  cannot  but  look  upon 
as  odious  and  oppressive."  Mr.  Fisher  Ames,  in  an  ex- 
travagant speech  on  the  woeful  effects  likely  to  follow  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  73 

enactment  of  the  proposed  duty  on  molasses,  used  the  fol- 
lowing language  :  "  Mothers  will  tell  their  children,  when 
they  solicit  their  daily  and  accustomed  nutriment,  that  the 
new  law  forbids  them  the  use  of  it ;  and  they  will  grow  up 
in  detestation  of  the  hand  which  proscribes  their  innocent 
food  and  the  occupation  of  their  fathers."  And  yet  all 
the  while  none  knew  better  than  Fisher  Ames  that  the 
mothers  likely  to  be  most  distressed  were  the  owners  of 
distilleries,  and  that  the  occupation  of  the  fathers  that  the 
children  were  to  be  debarred  from  following  was  sending 
this  rum  to  Africa  to  be  used  to  buy  slaves.  New  Eng- 
land selfishness  again  triumphed.  The  proposed  duty  on 
molasses  was  reduced  from  six  cents  to  two  and  a  half 
cents  a  gallon,  and  rum  was  assessed  at  ten  cents  per 
proof  gallon,  while  all  other  spirits  were  to  pay  but  eight 
cents. 

Such,  then,  is  a  brief  history  of  the  inception  and 
growth  of  our  present  navigation  laws.  Conceived  in  sin 
and  brought  forth  in  iniquity,  they  seemed  to  have  entailed 
a  curse  (not  yet  fully  worked  out,  but  in  the  process  of 
completion),  general  for  the  whole  country,  but  more 
especially  on  that  section  whose  fathers  sold  their  honor 
to  accomplish  the  result,  and  who  thereby  merited  exe- 
cration for  having  entailed,  for  eighteen  long  years,  the 
horrors  of  the  African  slave-trade.  And  when  one  jour- 
neys through  New  England,  and  sees  how  thick  are  the 
graves  of  her  sons,  slain  in  a  war  which  slavery  originated, 
the  question  might  suggest  itself:  Would  these  graves 


74  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

exist,  had  the  ancestors  of  those  who  fill  them  not  con- 
sented to  strengthen  and  perpetuate  domestic  slavery  as 
a  consideration  for  the  privilege  of  doing  another  wrong ; 
namely,  that  of  restricting  their  fellow-citizens  from  freely 
exchanging  the  products  of  their  labor  ? 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE   PROVISIONS    OF   OUR   NAVIGATION    LAWS. 

HAVING  traced  the  inception  and  growth  of  the  naviga- 
tion laws  of  the  United  States,  let  us  next  inquire  into 
their  provisions.  They  may  be,  in  the  main,  stated  and 
illustrated  as  follows  :  — 

1.  No  American  citizen  is  allowed  to  import  a  foreign- 
built  vessel,  in  the  sense  of  purchasing,  acquiring  a  registry 
or  title  to,  or  of  using  her  as  his  own  property  ;  the  only 
other  absolute  prohibitions  of  imports,  on  the  part  of  the 
United  States,  being  in  respect  to  counterfeit  money  and 
obscene  publications  or  objects.  —  Revised  Statutes  of  the 
United  States,  sect.  4,132. 

Furthermore,  while  we  are  the  only  people  in  the  world 
who  are  forbidden  to  purchase  foreign-built  vessels,  we 
freely  permit  all  the  world  to  enter  our  ports  with  vessels 
purchased  in  any  market.  Precluded,  therefore,  by  the 
first  provisions  of  our  navigation  laws,  from  engaging  on 
equal  terms  in  the  carrying  trade  with  foreigners,  we  won- 
der and  complain  that  the  carrying  trade  of  even  our  own 
products  has  passed  from  our  control. 

2.  An  American  vessel  ceases  to  be  such  if  owned  in 
the   smallest  degree   by  any  person   naturalized  in   the 


76  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

United  States  who  may,  after  acquiring  such  ownership, 
reside  "for  more  than  one  year  in  the  country  in  which 
he  originated,  or  more  than  two  years  in  any  foreign 
country,  unless  such  person  be  a  consul  or  other  public 
agent  of  the  United  States." — United  States  Revised 
Statutes,  sect.  4,134. 

3.  If  a  native-born  American  citizen,  for  health,  pleasure, 
or  any  other  purpose,  except  as  a  consul  of  the  United 
States  or  as  a  partner  or  agent  in  an  exclusively  American 
mercantile  house,  decides  to  reside  ("  usually  ")  in  some  for- 
eign country,  any  American  vessel  of  which  he  may  be,  in 
all  or  any  part,  owner,  at  once  loses  its  register,  and  ceases 
to  be  entitled  to  the  protection  of  the  flag  of  the  United 
States,  even  though  the  vessel  may  have  been  of  American 
construction,  and  have  regularly  paid  taxes  in  the  United 
States,  and  the  owner  himself  has  no  thought  of  finally 
relinquishing  his  American  citizenship.  —  United  States 
Revised  Statutes,  sect.  4,133. 

To  illustrate  this  provision  of  our  navigation  laws,  let 
us  suppose  Capt.  John  Smith,  not  a  naturalized  citizen, 
but  a  native  American,  is  an  owner,  in  all  or  part,  of  an 
American  vessel.  He  becomes  afflicted  with  a  disease  of 
the  lungs,  and,  for  his  health,  goes  to  live  in  the  South  of 
France,  on  account  of  the  balmy  atmosphere  that  prevails 
there.  The  moment  that  Capt.  John  thus,  under  the  law, 
begins  to  "usually  reside"  in  a  foreign  country,  his  vessel 
is  liable  to  lose  its  register  and  the  protection  of  the  flag 
of  his  country. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  77 

4.  Every  citizen  of  the  United  States  obtaining  a  regis- 
ter for  an  American  vessel  must  make  oath  "  that  there  is 
no  subject  or  citizen  of  any  foreign  power  or  state  directly 
or  indirectly,  by  way  of  trust  or  confidence,  or  otherwise, 
interested   in    such  vessel    or  in  the  profits  thereof."  — 
United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  4,142. 

We  invite  foreign  capital  to  come  to  us,  and  help  build 
our  railroads,  work  our  mines,  insure  our  property,  and 
even  buy  and  carry  our  government  bonds  as  invest- 
ments ;  but  if  a  single  dollar  of  such  capital  is  used  to 
build  an  American  ship,  and  thereby  represents  an  owner- 
ship to  any  extent  of  the  value  received,  we  declare  the 
ship  to  be  thereby  so  tainted  as  to  be  unworthy  of  the 
benefit  of  American  laws. 

5.  A  foreigner  may  superintend  an  American  factory, 
run  an  American  railroad,  be  president  of  an  American 
college,  or  hold  a  commission  in  the  American  army,  but 
he  cannot  command  or  be  an  officer  of  a  registered  Amer- 
ican vessel.  —  United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  4,131. 

Notwithstanding  this  express  provision  of  law,  it  is  an 
indisputable  fact  that  there  is  hardly  an  American  vessel 
engaged  in  foreign  trade  that  has  not  one  or  more  for- 
eigners employed  as  officers ;  and  instances,  it  is  said,  are 
not  rare,  of  American  vessels  which  have  no  citizens  of 
the  United  States  on  board  except  the  master. 

If  Capt.  John  Smith,  being  a  foreigner,  took  command 
of  an  American  vessel,  and  falsely  swore  that  he  was  an 
American  citizen,  he  would  "forfeit  and  pay  the  sum  of 


78  OUR   MERCHANT  MARINE. 

one  thousand  dollars."  If  one  of  the  owners  should  take 
such  oath,  Capt.  Smith  not  being  in  the  district,  the 
vessel  would  be  subject  to  forfeiture;  but  no  such  case  of 
forfeiture  has  ever  occurred.  She  would,  however,  not  be 
subject  to  forfeiture  "  if  Capt.  Smith  had  been  appointed 
the  lowest  officer  on  the  vessel."  To  be  sure,  the  law 
requires  that  "  officers  of  vessels  of  the  United  States 
shall  in  all  cases  be  citizens  of  the  United  States;"  but 
there  is  no  penalty  whatever  imposed  on  the  vessel  if  they 
are  not. 

Many  American  citizens,  on  the  other  hand,  undoubt- 
edly own  vessels  under  foreign  flags.  Some  of  them 
transferred  their  vessels  to  English  colors  during  the  war, 
to  escape  capture  by  Confederate  war  vessels ;  but  there 
are  many  who  adopt  this  expedient  to  obtain  cheap  ships. 
They  engage  a  trustworthy  English  clerk,  for  instance, 
and  buy  the  vessel  in  his  name,  holding  a  mortgage  for 
her  full  value  as  security. 

Some  years  ago  the  American  consul-general  to  China 
—  Mr.  Seward  —  in  a  report  to  the  State  Department 
stated,  as  within  his  personal  experience  from  1862  to. 
1875,  "that  the  rigid  enforcement  of  this  law  would  often 
have  forced  the  owners  or  agents  of  those  vessels  engaged 
in  that  part  of  the  world  to  lay  up  their  ships  or  transfer 
them  to  other  flags." 

6.  No  foreign-built  vessel,  or  vessel  in  any  part  owned 
by  a  subject  of  a  foreign  power,  can  enter  a  port  of  the 
United  States,  and  then  go  to  another  domestic  port  with 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  79 

any  new  cargo  or  with  any  part  of  her  original  cargo  that 
has  been  once  unladen,  without  having  previously  voyaged 
to  and  touched  at  some  other  port  of  some  foreign  coun- 
try, under  penalty  of  confiscation.  By  a  comparatively 
recent  construction  of  the  law,  all  direct  traffic  by  sea 
between  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  ports  of  the  United 
States  via  Cape  Horn  or  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  or 
across  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  is  held  to  be  of  the  nature 
of  a  coasting  trade  or  voyage  in  which  foreign  vessels 
cannot  participate.  —  United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect. 

4,347- 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  there  has  been  no  attempt  in 
recent  times,  on  the  part  of  the  English,  French,  or  Dutch 
governments,  to  interfere  with  the  transport  of  merchan- 
dise by  American  ships  by  the  common  highway  of  the 
ocean,  between  the  home  ports  of  these  countries  and 
their  colonial  possessions,  this  construction  of  law,  not 
contemplated  at  the  period  of  its  enactment,  was  regarded 
by  Europe  as  a  bit  of  very  sharp  and  mean  practice  on  the 
part  of  the  United  States,  as  it  undoubtedly  was. 

7.  An  American  vessel   once  sold  or  transferred  to  a 
foreigner  can   never  be   bought   back  again  and  become 
American  property,  not  even  if  the  transfer  has  been  the 
result  of  capture  and  condemnation  by  a  foreign  power  in 
time  of  war.  —  United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  4,165. 

8.  A  vessel  under  thirty  tons  cannot  be  used  to  import 
any  thing  at  any  seaboard  port.  —  United  States  Revised 
Statutes,  sect.  3,095. 


80  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

9.  Goods,    wares,    and    merchandise,    the    produce    of 
countries  east  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  when  imported 
from  countries  west  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  are  sub- 
ject to  a  duty  of  ten  per  cent  in  addition  to  the  duties 
imposed  on  such  articles  when  imported  directly*     This 
law  is   interpreted   so   stringently  that   old   second-hand 
gunny-bags,  nearly  worn  out,  do  not  lose  their  distinctive- 
ness  to  an  extent  sufficient  to  exempt  them  from  addi- 
tional duties  if  they  finally  come  to  the  United  States,  in 
the  process  of  using,  from  a  place  west  of  the  Cape  of 
Good    Hope.      A  few  years   ago   a  vessel   from    China, 
destined  to  Montreal,  Canada,  was  sent,  on  arriving,  to 
New  York  without  breaking  bulk.     It  was  held  that  the 
voyage  ceased  in  Canada,  and  that  the  new  voyage  to  New 
York  subjected  the  cargo  to  an  additional  ten  per  cent. 
By  the  original  navigation  laws  (Act  of  1790)  it  was  pro- 
vided that  the  tariff  on  all  articles  imported  in  American 
vessels  shall  be  less  than  if  imported  in  foreign  vessels. 
On  "Hyson"  tea  the  duty  in  American  vessels  was  twenty 
cents  per  pound,  in  foreign  vessels  forty-five  cents.     The 
present  discriminating  duties   on   products  of   countries 
east  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  imported  indirectly,  are  a 
remnant  and   legacy  of   these   old    restrictions.  —  United 
States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  2,501. 

10.  If  a  vessel  of  the  United  States  becomes  damaged 
on  a  foreign  voyage,  and  is  repaired  in  a  foreign  port,  her 

1  This  provision  of  law,  after  an  experience  of  over  ninety  years,  the 
present  Congress  (1882)  has  repealed  after  Jan.  r,  1883. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  8 1 

owner  or  master  must  make  entry  of  such  repairs  at  a 
custom-house  of  the  United  States,  as  an  import,  and  pay 
a  duty  on  the  same  equal  to  one-half  the  cost  of  the  foreign 
work  or  material,  or  fifty  per  cent  ad  valorem ;  and  this 
law  extends  so  far  as  to  include  boats  that  may  be  obtained 
at  sea  from  a  passing  foreign  vessel  in  order  to  assure  the 
safety  of  the  crew  or  passengers  of  the  American  vessel. 
—  United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  3,114. 

To  the  credit  of  former  days  it  should  be  said  that  this 
provision  of  law  was  not  a  part  of  the  original  navigation 
laws  of  the  United  States,  but  was  incorporated  into  them 
by  special  statute  passed  July  18,  1866,  entitled  "An  Act 
to  prevent  Smuggling  and  for  other  purposes."  Under  the 
Treasury  regulations  it  is  held  that,  although  no  part  of 
the  proper  equipment  of  a  vessel  arriving  in  the  United 
States  from  a  foreign  country  is  liable  to  duty,  such  equip- 
ment, if  considered  by  the  United  States  revenue  officers 
as  redundant,  is  liable  to  the  payment  of  duty  as  a  foreign 
import,  although  there  may  be  no  intent  of  landing,  dis- 
posing of,  or  using  such  extra  equipment,  except  in  con- 
nection with  the  vessel.  Thus,  for  example,  when  two 
sets  of  chains  were  found  on  board  of  a  foreign  vessel, 
and  one  set  was  held  to  be  all  that  was  necessary,  the 
other  set  was  made  chargeable  with  duty.  In  another 
case,  where  anchors  and  chains  were  bonded  on  importa- 
tion, and  at  the  same  time  entered  for  exportation,  and 
placed  on  board  the  vessel  as  a  part  of  her  equipment,  it 
was  held  by  the  Treasury  that  the  legal  duties  should  be 
collected  on  the  same. 


82  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

1 1.  Foreign  vessels  losing  rudder,  sternpost,  or  breaking 
shaft,  and  arriving  in  the  United  States  in  distress,  cannot 
import  others  to  replace  these  articles  here  without  pay- 
ment of  the  duty  on  the  same.  In  one  case  of  actual 
occurrence,  a  foreign  line  of  steamers  left  —  during  a  trip 
interval  —  their  mooring-chains,  of  foreign  manufacture, 
on  an  American  wharf.  Some  over-vigilant  revenue-officer 
reported  the  occurrence  to  the  Treasury  Department,  and 
it  was  decided,  that,  as  the  chains  were  landed,  the  legal 
duties  should  be  collected  from  them  as  an  importation. 
A  foreign  vessel  cannot  even  land  copper  sheathing  for 
the  sole  purpose  of  being  re-coppered  by  American  work- 
men, without  paying  duties  on  the  old  copper  stripped  off, 
and  the  new  copper  put  on,  as  separate  and  distinct  im- 
ports. During  the  year  1871  the  owner  of  a  Dutch  vessel 
entered  at  Boston,  ignorant  of  the  peculiar  features  of  the 
tariff  of  the  United  States  in  respect  to  the  ocean  carrying 
trade,  put  on  board,  at  the  foreign  port  of  clearance,  a 
quantity  of  sheet-copper  sufficient  to  sheath  the  bottom 
of  his  vessel,  it  being  intended  to  have  the  work  done  in 
the  United  States  upon  her  arrival,  in  order  to  save  time, 
and  put  the  vessel  in  good  order  for  her  return  voyage. 
The  agent,  advised  of  this  arrangement,  referred  the 
matter  to  the  officials  of  the  Boston  custom-house  for 
instructions,  only  to  learn  that  the  new  sheathing-metal 
could  not  be  used  in  the  United  States  as  proposed,  with- 
out paying  a  duty  of  forty-five  per  cent,  while  the  copper 
taken  off  the  ship's  bottom  must  also  pay  a  duty  of  four 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  83 

cents  per  pound  as  an  importation  of  old  copper.  The 
agent  signified  his  willingness  to  pay  the  latter,  and  sell 
the  old  metal  for  what  it  would  bring,  but  requested  to  be 
allowed  to  land  the  new  copper  in  bond  for  re-exportation, 
as  it  would  be  carried  out  by  the  same  vessel  that  brought 
it  in.  He  was  informed,  however,  that  the  bond  for  ex- 
portation required  for  its  cancellation  a  certificate  of  the 
landing  of  the  bonded  goods  in  the  foreign  port  for  which 
its  export  was  declared,  which  could  not  be  obtained  if  it 
was  entered  at  the  port  of  destination  upon,  and  not  in, 
the  ship  carrying  it.  The  consequence  was,  that  when 
the  ship  discharged  her  cargo  at  Boston,  she  sailed  for 
Halifax,  N.S.,  carrying  her  sheathing-copper  with  her, 
and  after  having  been  there  coppered  by  the  shipwrights 
of  the  British  Provinces  returned  in  ballast  to  Boston  for 
her  return  cargo,  —  all  this  costly  proceeding  being  cheaper 
than  the  payment  of  forty-five  per  cent  duty  for  the  privi- 
lege of  employing  American  workmen  to  take  off  the  old 
sheathing  and  put  on  the  new. 

12.  If  a  citizen  of  the  United  States  buys  a  vessel  of 
foreign  build  which  has  been  wrecked  on  our  coast,  takes 
her  into  port,  repairs,  and  renders  her  again  serviceable 
and  seaworthy,  he  cannot  make  her  American  property, 
unless  it  is  proved  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  Treasury 
Department,  that  the  repairs  put  upon  such  vessel  are 
equal  to  three-fourths  of  the  cost  of  the  vessel  when  so 
repaired.  —  United  States  Revised  Statutes,  sect.  4,136. 

The  following  is  an  illustration  of  the  working  of  this 


84  °UR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

statute :  In  1871  a  citizen  of  Baltimore  purchased  a  foreign- 
built  vessel  wrecked  on  the  American  coast,  and  abandoned 
to  the  underwriters,  and,  by  spending  a  large  sum  in  recon- 
struction, rendered  her  again  seaworthy.  He  then,  being 
desirous  of  employing  his  capital  embodied  in  this  instru- 
mentality of  trade  in  the  most  profitable  manner,  and 
assuming  that  the  reconstructed  wreck  was  his  lawful 
property,  arranged  for  an  outward  cargo,  under  the  flag 
of  the  United  States.  But  when  the  vessel  was  ready  to 
sail,  registry  was  refused  by  the  customs  officials,  on  the 
ground  that  the  vessel  was  of  foreign  construction,  —  the 
sum  of  the  repairs  put  on  the  wreck  being  a  little  less 
than  three-fourths  of  the  original  cost  of  the  vessel ;  or, 
in  other  words,  the  substance  of  this  decision,  which  was 
correct  in  law,  was,  that  while  the  citizen,  under  the  laws 
of  the  United  States,  might  lawfully  buy  and  acquire  title 
to  a  wreck,  and  use  it  for  any  purpose  other  than  naviga- 
tion, —  as,  for  example,  as  a  dock,  a  house,  or  a  coal-bin, 
—  he  could  not  acquire  title  to  it  and  make  it  American 
property,  lawful  to  use  as  a  vessel,  even  after  he  had  paid 
duties  on  its  old  materials  as  imports,  unless  he  could 
show  that  he  had  expended  upon  the  abandoned  construc- 
tion, for  the  purpose  of  restoring  it  to  its  original  quality 
for  service,  a  sum  nearly  equivalent  to  the  cost  of  building 
an  entirely  new  vessel.  The  owner  by  law,  most  merci- 
fully, in  such  cases  is  not,  however,  deprived  of  the  privi- 
lege of  selling  the  property  to  a  foreigner. 

13.  Every  vessel  belonging  to  the  mercantile    marine 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  85 

of  the  United  States  engaged  in  foreign  trade  —  vessels 
employed  in  the  fisheries  excepted — must  pay  annually 
into  the  Federal  Treasury  a  tonnage-tax  at  the  rate  of 
thirty  cents  per  ton. —  United  States  Revised  Statutes, 
sect.  4,219. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  war  there  were  no  tonnage 
taxes ;  but  by  the  Act  of  July,  1862,  a  tonnage-tax  of  ten 
cents  per  ton  was  imposed,  which  was  afterwards  increased 
to  thirty  cents,  the  present  rate.  Although  there  was 
nothing  specific  in  the  recent  enactments  to  warrant  it, 
and  American  shipping  engaged  in  foreign  trade  was  in 
such  a  condition  as  to  demand  the  kindliest  consideration 
from  Government,  the  Treasury  officials,  interpreting  the 
statute  according  to  the  invariable  rule  for  the  benefit  of 
the  Government  and  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  citizen, 
were  in  the  habit,  up  to  1867,  of  collecting  this  tax  at 
every  entry  of  a  vessel  from  a  foreign  port ;  but  by  the 
Act  of  March,  1867,  tonnage  taxes  can  now  be  levied  but 
once  a  year.  On  a  ship  of  one  thousand  tons  the  present 
tax,  amounting  to  three  hundred  dollars  per  annum,  repre- 
sents the  profits  or  interest  —  reckoned  at  six  per  cent  — 
on  an  invested  capital  of  five  thousand  dollars,  and  on  a 
ship  of  two  thousand  tons  of  ten  thousand  dollars.  Mr. 
F.  A.  Pike  of  Maine,  in  a  speech  in  the  United  States 
House  of  Representatives,  May,  1868,  stated  that  this  tax 
was  equivalent,  in  many  instances,  to  three  per  cent  on 
the  market  valuation  of  an  inferior  class  of  American 
vessels,  employed  only  in  the  summer  months,  and  largely 
owned  by  his  constituents. 


86  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

Vessels  belonging  to  foreign  states,  between  whom  and 
the  United  States  ordinary  commercial  relations  are  estab- 
lished, pay  the  same  tonnage-taxes  as  American  vessels. 
But  if  any  person  not  a  citizen  of  the  United  States 
becomes  an  owner,  to  the  extent  of  the  merest  fraction, 
in  a  ship  of  American  build,  then  such  ship  is  not  entitled 
to  the  privileges  accorded  to  ships  owned  wholly  by  for- 
eigners, but  must  pay  on  entering  a  port  of  the  United 
States  a  tonnage-tax  of  sixty  cents,  or  double  rate,  and 
such  vessel  at  once  ceases  to  be  entitled  to  registry  or 
enrolment  as  a  vessel  of  the  United  States.  Here,  then, 
we  have  piled  up,  as  it  were,  on  the  top  of  all  other  pro- 
visions, another  direct,  odious,  and  stupid  discrimination 
against  the  employment  of  foreign  capital,  provided  it 
should  so  incline,  for  the  developing,  of  the  American 
shipping  interest  and  the  employment  of  labor  even  in 
our  own  dockyards  and  harbors.  Supposing  a  similar  law 
to  be  proposed,  discriminating  in  like  manner  against  the 
investment  of  foreign  capital  in  American  railroads,  mines, 
factories,  and  mercantile  enterprises  generally,  does  any 
one  doubt  that  the  proponent  would  be  at  once  hooted  into 
contempt  ?  And  yet  the  hypothetical  law  is  no  more 
absurd  than  the  law  that  actually  exists  upon  the  statute- 
book. 

Practically  the  law  is  a  dead  letter.  In  the  case  of 
ordinary  vessels  rigid  inquiry  as  to  ownership  is  rarely  or 
never  instituted,  and  the  oath  required  is  regarded  and 
taken  as  a  mere  form.  In  case  of  incorporated  American 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  8/ 

ocean  navigation  companies  (if  there  are  any  such)  the 
president  of  the  company  has  only  to  swear  to  the  owner- 
ship of  any  vessel  by  the  company,  and  the  Federal 
officials  will  not  care  if  the  ownership  of  one  or  a  majority 
of  the  shares  of  the  corporation  vest  in  citizens  of  foreign 
nationalities ;  the  provision  of  the  statute,  as  with  a  view 
of  making  the  law  of  non-effect,  being,  that,  in  this  swear- 
ing to  ownership  by  a  company,  it  shall  not  be  necessary 
to  designate  the  names  of  the  persons  comprising  such 
company.  The  result  of  this  is,  that  any  foreigner  can 
purchase  shares  in  any  American  navigation  company, 
and  not  a  vessel  of  their  fleet  will  thereby  lose  American 
registration  and  American  protection ;  but  if  a  foreigner 
became  the  owner  of  the  smallest  fraction  of  a  hundred- 
ton  steamboat,  plying  between  Key  West  and  Havana, 
the  registration  of  such  vessel  would  be  immediately 
vitiated. 

If  a  Sunday-school  or  a  picnic  party,  out  on  an  excur- 
sion, happen  to  come  into  an  American  port  on  a  foreign 
(Canadian)  vessel  (as  was  recently  the  case  on  one  of  our 
upper  lakes),  for  mere  temporary  and  pleasure  purposes, 
the  vessel  is  liable  to  a  tonnage-tax ;  and  a  libel  against 
the  vessel,  instituted  by  an  over-zealous  official  for  its  pay- 
ment, was  decided  by  the  Treasury  Department  (August, 
1876)  to  be  a  proceeding  which  the  Government  must 
enforce. 

14.  By  the  Act  of  June  6,  1872,  all  materials  necessary 
for  the  construction  of  vessels  built  in  the  United  States 


88  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

for  the  purpose  of  foreign  trade  may  be  imported  and 
used  free  of  duty.  But  no  American  vessel  receiving  the 
benefit  of  this  act  can  engage  in  the  American  coasting 
trade  for  more  than  two  months  in  any  one  year  without 
payment  of  the  duties  which  have  been  remitted. 

15.  The  several  ports  of  the  United  States  are  classi- 
fied by  districts ;  and  in  each  district  one  port  is  desig- 
nated by  statute  as  a  "port  of  entry,"  and  others  as 
"  ports  of  delivery."  All  vessels,  on  arriving  from  a  for- 
eign country  in  any  district,  must  first  report  at  the 
established  port  of  entry,  and  there  conform  to  the  details 
of  the  custom-house  service ;  after  which  the  vessel,  if 
American,  can  proceed,  if  desired,  to  any  port  of  delivery 
in  the  district  for  the  purpose  of  unloading.  But  if  the 
vessel  be  foreign,  it  can  only  discharge  at  the  port  of 
entry,  even  though  its  cargo  be  imported  exclusively  for 
the  use  of  American  citizens  at  a  port  of  delivery.  A 
ship,  therefore,  may  pass  almost  within  hail  of  the  point 
of  destination  of  its  cargo,  and  yet  be  compelled  to  un- 
load many  miles  away,  thus  necessitating  re-shipping  and 
repeated  handling,  at  much  additional  expense.  Thus,  the 
customs  district  of  Boston  and  Charlestown  comprises  only 
one  port  of  entry,  —  Boston,  —  while  Cambridge,  Medford, 
Hingham,  Cohasset,  etc.,  are  all  ports  of  delivery  only. 
If  a  foreign  vessel  arrives  from  abroad  with  a  cargo  of 
hemp  for  Hingham,  instead  of  proceeding  direct  to  the 
wharf  in  that  port,  she  must  first  sail  right  by,  enter  her- 
self and  cargo  in  Boston,  and  then  unlade  at  a  Boston 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  89 

wharf,  when  the  goods  may  be  re-shipped  by  packet  or 
railroad  for  Hingham.  Again  :  if  a  foreign  vessel  is 
loaded  with  a  cargo  for  Saybrook,  a  port  of  delivery  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Connecticut  River,  she  must  pass  directly  by 
her  destination,  and  proceed  forty  miles  up  the  river — 
often  with  difficulty  navigable — to  Middletown,  the  port 
of  entry  for  the  district,  and  there  discharge,  and  provide 
for  the  reconveyance  of  her  cargo  by  some  other  method 
of  transportation  to  the  place  where  it  is  wanted. 

The  following  will  also  illustrate  in  some  degree  the 
manner  in  which  the  navigation  laws  of  the  United  States 
have  been  executed  :  — 

All  vessels  of  the  United  States  engaged  in  the  coast- 
ing trade  are  required  to  be  enrolled  and  licensed ;  and 
vessels  engaging  in  trade  and  transportation  without  pre- 
viously procuring  such  enrolment  or  license  are  liable  to 
seizure  and  heavy  penalties.  On  the  east  bank  of  the 
Hudson,  in  the  city  of  Troy,  State  of  New  York,  there 
are  extensive  iron-works,  the  coal  and  ore  supplies  for 
which  are  largely  transported  over  the  Erie  and  Cham- 
plain  Canals.  Boats  coming  down  these  canals  loaded 
with  such  supplies  are  locked  into  the  Hudson  at  West 
Troy,  a  point  on  the  west  bank  nearly  opposite  to  the 
furnaces ;  then,  after  crossing  the  river,  delivering  their 
freight,  and  recrossing,  re-enter  the  canal,  and  return  on 
their  route  for  another  similar  cargo.  Some  years  ago 
the  officials  of  the  United  States  Treasury  Department 
decided  that  under  our  navigation  laws  this  temporary 


QO  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

entry  of  boats  from  the  canals  into  the  Hudson  for  the 
purpose  of  delivering  cargo,  and  their  subsequent  return 
into  the  canal,  constituted  a  coasting  voyage,  for  the  en- 
gaging in  which  it  was  obligatory  on  the  owners  of  the 
canal-boats  to  have  previously  taken  out  a  license.  Of 
course  the  owners,  not  anticipating  any  such  official  inter- 
pretation of  the  law,  had  not  provided  themselves  with 
licenses ;  but  this  nevertheless  did  not  prevent  a  large 
number  of  boats  from  being  seized  and  libelled  for  viola- 
tion of  the  navigation  laws,  from  which  they  were  only 
released  after  expensive  and  annoying  litigation  and  the 
payment  of  considerable  sums  in  the  way  of  costs  or 
penalties. 

Take  another  illustration  of  more  recent  date.  It  has 
of  late  years  been  customary  for  merchants  and  shippers 
on  our  northern  lakes  to  buy  and  use  for  transporting 
grain  large  barges  or  hulks  built  in  Canada;  and  as  such 
constructions  are  not  capable  of  moving  or  navigating 
except  as  they  are  towed,  and  are  not  provided  with  the 
usual  appurtenances  for  navigation,  they  have  not  been 
regarded  as  subject  to  the  provisions  of  our  navigation 
laws  relative  to  foreign  vessels.  During  the  summer  of 
1880,  however,  the  collector  of  the  port  of  Erie,  Penn.,  on 
Lake  Erie,  called  the  attention  of  the  Treasury  Depart- 
ment to  the  circumstance  that  a  certain  barge,  "  The 
William  H.  Vosburg,"  had  been  guilty  of  the  heinous 
offence  of  hoisting  a  sail  on  its  apology  for  a  mast, — 
whether  for  the  sake  of  avoiding  a  dangerous  rock  or  a 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  9 1 

lee  shore  was  not  stated,  —  and  asked  for  instructions. 
The  Department  promptly  replied,  "that  the  only  con- 
dition upon  which  that  barge  could  continue  to  navigate 
those  waters  was  to  hoist  her  sails  temporarily ;  any  at- 
tempt to  keep  her  canvas  up  beyond  that  would  get  her 
into  trouble.  Being  Canadian  built,  she  could  not  be 
enrolled ;  and,  by  consequence,  the  permanent  use  of  sail 
upon  her  would  entail  forfeiture  of  cargoes  and  the  pay- 
ment of  double  tonnage-tax  at  every  port  of  arrival."  The 
official  correspondence  does  not  inform  us  what  the  result 
was  ;  but  it  is  safe  to  presume  the  little  barge  had  to  take 
down  her  little  sail,  as  otherwise  she  would  have  been 
simply  taxed  out  of  existence,  in  accordance  with  the 
statutes  in  such  cases  made  and  provided. 

In  August,  1875,  the  Canadian  yacht  "Oriole,"  of  less 
than  fifty  tons  burden,  owned  in  Toronto,  but  belonging 
to  the  International  Yacht  Club,  and  also  to  the  Yacht 
Club  of  Detroit,  arrived  in  Chicago  from  Toronto  with  a 
pleasure-party  of  seven  gentlemen,  for  the  purpose  of  par-, 
ticipating,  on  invitation  of  the  Chicago  Yacht  Club,  in  a 
regatta  at  the  latter  port,  having  previously  made  a  tour 
of  the  lakes,  stopping  at  various  points  of  interest,  and 
taking  on  board  on  several  occasions  pleasure-parties  of 
ladies  and  gentlemen,  who  were  entertained  in  part  by 
transportation  from  port  to  port.  On  arrival  at  Chicago 
"  The  Oriole  "  was  complained  of  to  the  Treasury  Depart- 
ment as  having  violated  the  navigation  laws  of  the  United 
States,  which  forbid  foreign  vessels  from  participating  in 


92  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  coasting  trade  and  from  conveying  passengers  from 
one  American  port  to  another;  and  proceedings  looking  to 
seizure  and  confiscation  were  contemplated.  This  pen- 
alty the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  graciously  remitted, 
inasmuch  as  there  was  evidently  no  intent  on  the  part  of 
the  owners  of  "  The  Oriole "  to  violate  the  law ;  but 
owing  to  the  absence  of  proper  papers  showing  the 
nationality  and  occupation  of  the  yacht,  although  these 
were  well  known,  the  privilege  of  exemption  from  ton- 
nage-taxes accorded  by  law  to  foreign  pleasure-yachts  was 
not  granted.  The  Chicago  Yacht  Club  therefore  paid  on 
account  of  their  guests,  into  the  treasury  of  the  United 
States,  the  sum  of  fifteen  dollars,  which  doubtless  helped 
to  liquidate  the  public  debt ;  while  the  owners  of  "  The 
Oriole,"  not  knowing  what  other  legal  difficulties  they 
might  encounter  from  a  prolonged  sojourn,  slipped  out  of 
port  in  the  early  morning,  and  returned  home  as  soon  as 
practicable. 

We  are  accustomed,  as  we  read  of  the  sumptuary  laws 
and  arbitrary  restrictions  on  commercial  and  personal 
freedom  in  years  long  past,  to  congratulate  ourselves,  as 
it  were  involuntarily,  that  we  live  on  a  higher  and  different 
plane,  and  that  among  nations  calling  themselves  civilized 
and  enlightened,  such  things  are  no  longer  possible.  It 
would  be  difficult,  however,  to  find  in  any  record  of  past 
experience  more  absurdities  and  iniquities  than  are  em- 
bodied in  the  so-called  navigation  laws  of  the  United 
States  at  present  existing,  and  in  the  details  of  their  ad- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  93 

ministration  during  the  last  quarter  of  a  century.  And 
yet  it  was  in  respect  to  these  same  laws  that  a  convention 
of  one  of  the  great  political  parties,  held  in  Maine  in 
August,  1877,  unanimously  resolved  that,  "enacted  in  the 
infancy  of  the  Republic,  they  have  proved  their  wisdom  by 
long  and  varied  experience.  They  embody  the  matured 
judgment  of  three  generations  of  commercial  men.  Any 
radical  change  in  these  laws  would  be  detrimental  to  the 
highest  interests  of  American  commerce,  and  a  damaging 
blow  to  the  national  independence  of  the  country." 

In  answer  to  the  questions  which  must  naturally  here 
suggest  themselves  to  every  thoughtful  mind,  How  is  it 
that  such  a  code  of  laws  —  which  no  other  civilized  coun' 
try  would  permit  to  remain  upon  their  statute-books  — 
can  at  this  period  of  the  nineteenth  century  be  maintained 
and  defended  in  the  United  States  ?  and  how  happened  it 
that  a  convention  of  presumably  more  than  average  intel- 
ligence could  make  public  declaration  of  such  nonsense 
and  untruth  as  was  embodied  in  the  resolutions  of  the 
Maine  convention  above  quoted? — it  may  be  said  that 
upon  no  one  public  matter  have  the  American  people, 
until  within  a  very  recent  period,  been  so  little  acquainted 
as  in  respect  to  our  commercial  laws  and  regulations. 
Scattered  through  statute  enactments  for  over  ninety 
years,  and  with  court  and  treasury  interpretations  for 
the  same  period  forming  a  part  of  the  law  and  all  of  its 
administration,  though  not  embodied  in  the  statute,  it  has 
not  been  an  easy  matter  for  even  those  engaged  in  the 


94  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

business  of  law  and  law-making  to  know  what  the  naviga- 
tion laws  actually  were ;  and  it  is  exceedingly  doubtful 
whether  in  the  convention  referred  to  there  was  one  single 
man  that  had  any  clear  and  definite  knowledge  of  how 
these  laws  originated,  what  they  embody,  and  what  is  the 
sphere  of  their  influence. 

And  to-day,  notwithstanding  recent  discussions  of  their 
nature,  it  is  doubtful  whether,  out  of  the  three  hundred 
and  seventy-eight  members  of  Congress,  as  many  as  fifty 
can  at  once  define  the  difference  between  a  vessel  "  en- 
rolled "  and  a  vessel  "registered ;  "  or  if  any  of  the  officials 
of  the  customs  service  or  Treasury  Department  can  at 
once,  and  correctly,  tell  in  detail  how  to  transfer  the 
license  of  a  merchant-ship  or  pleasure-yacht  from  one 
collection  district  of  the  United  States  to  another.1  And 
it  is  further  curious  to  note  that  not  a  single  writer  or 
speaker  of  note,  who,  within  recent  years,  has  undertaken 
to  advocate  the  navigation  laws  of  the  United  States,  or 
oppose  their  repeal  or  essential  modification, — possibly 
from  lack  of  knowledge,  or  fear  lest  a  full  exposition  would 
of  itself  defeat  and  neutralize  his  argument, — has  ever 
ventured  to  tell  his  readers  or  hearers  what  the  code  really 
embraces  or  provides  for  in  detail. 

1  It  required  some  of  the  best  legal  talent  in  the  city  of  New  York,  a  few 
years  since,  to  effect  this  result  in  the  case  of  a  pleasure-yacht;  and  the 
owner  of  the  yacht  writes,  that  although  he  has  done  his  best,  and  incurred 
considerable  expense  and  no  end  of  trouble,  to  find  out  the  law  and  comply 
with  it,  he  is  in  daily  expectation  of  a  visit  from  the  revenue  officials  of  the 
United  States,  and  a  notification  of  a  fine  for  some  violation  of  the  statutes. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  95 


CHAPTER  VI. 

HOW   AND   WHY    GREAT    BRITAIN     REPEALED     HER    NAVIGA- 
TION   LAWS,  AND    THE    RESULTS    OF    REPEAL. 

AT  the  period  when  the  navigation  laws  of  the  United 
States  were  mainly  enacted —  1789-1820  —  all  other  mari- 
time nations  had  similar  codes.  But  since  then  all  mari- 
time nations,  except  the  United  States,  have  either  greatly 
modified  the  old-time  restrictions  which  they  once  imposed 
on  the  building  and  use  of  vessels,  or  abolished  them 
altogether,  —  Chinese  and  Japanese  commercial  exclusive- 
ness  having  even  yielded  to  the  liberal  spirit  of  the  age. 
In  this  reform  work  Great  Britain  took  the  lead  at  the 
very  time  (1849)  when  the  competition  of  the  United 
States  with  that  nation  for  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world 
upon  the  high  seas  was  most  severe,  and  when  whatever 
of  benefit  could  possibly  accrue  from  restrictive  naviga- 
tion laws  to  Great  Britain  was  especially  likely  to  be 
manifested. 

As  the  situation  of  maritime  affairs  in  Great  Britain 
which  prompted  to  the  repeal  of  her  navigation  laws  was 
not  dissimilar  to  that  which  now  exists  in  the  United 
States ;  and  as  the  arguments  offered  in  the  House  of 
Commons  and  in  the  English  press  in  opposition  to  the 


96  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

adoption  of  a  new  and  liberal  commercial  policy  are  so 
much  alike  to  those  now  made  use  of  in  the  United  States 
for  the  same  purpose,  that,  mutatis  mutandis,  one  might 
almost  feel  warranted  in  accusing  American  speakers 
and  writers  of  having  plagiarized  without  reserve  from 
their  British  prototypes  of  1849;  and  as  like  causes,  acting 
under  like  conditions,  are  likely  to  be  followed  by  the  same 
results  in  the  economic  as  well  as  in  the  physical  world, — 
it  will  be  both  profitable  and  interesting  to  narrate  some- 
what in  detail,  at  this  point  of  our  discussion,  the  history 
and  results  of  British  experience. 

British  Experience  of  Navigation  Laws. 

Up  to  the  year  1821,  according  to  a  report  made  to  the 
House  of  Commons,  "  no  fewer  than  two  thousand  laws  " 
had  been  enacted  at  different  periods  for  the  protection, 
encouragement,  or  regulation  of  British  commerce  ;  "every 
one  of  which,"  according  to  the  testimony  of  McCulloch, 
which,  in  turn,  was  indorsed  by  Buckle  after  careful  re- 
investigation,  "was  an  unmitigated  evil." 

The  first  British  navigation  law  was  passed  in  1381, 
in  the  fifth  year  of  Richard  II.,  and  was  substantially 
what  has  recently  been  again  commended,  in  Congress 
and  out,  to  the  American  people  as  a  panacea  for  existing 
evils  ;  namely,  "  that  none  of  the  Kings  liege  people  should 
from  henceforth  ship  any  merchandise,  ingoing  out  or  coming 
within  the  realm  of  England,  but  only  in  ships  of  the  Kings 
liegance,  on  penalty  of  forfeiture  of  vessel  and  cargo." 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  97 

By  subsequent  enactments,  which  remained  in  force 
until  1849,  no  foreigner  could  own,  either  wholly  or  in 
part,  a  British  ship,  and  the  captain  and  at  least  three- 
fourths  of  the  crew  of  such  vessels  were  compelled  to  be 
British  subjects.  Certain  enumerated  articles  of  European 
produce  could  only  be  imported  into  the  United  Kingdom, 
for  consumption,  in  British  ships,  or  in  ships  of  the  coun- 
try of  which  the  goods  were  the  produce.  No  produce  of 
Asia,  Africa,  or  America  could  be  imported  for  consump- 
tion into  the  United  Kingdom,  from  any  European  port, 
in  any  ships  whatever.  And  such  produce  could  only  be 
imported  from  any  other  places  in  British  ships,  or  in  ships 
of  the  country  of  which  the  goods  were  the  produce.  No 
goods  could  be  carried  coastwise  from  one  part  of  the 
United  Kingdom  to  another,  except  in  British  ships.  No 
goods  could  be  carried  from  any  one  British  possession  in 
Asia,  Africa,  or  America,  to  another,  in  any  but  British 
ships.  No  foreign  ships  were  allowed  to  trade  with  any 
of  the  British  possessions,  unless  they  had  been  specially 
authorized  to  do  so  by  order  in  council.  No  goods  could 
be  exported  from  the  United  Kingdom  to  any  of  the 
British  possessions  in  Asia,  Africa,  or  America  (with 
some  exceptions  with  regard  to  India),  in  any  but  British 
ships.  Again,  during  the  whole  of  the  period  of  the 
existence  of  the  British  navigation  laws,  the  predominant 
idea  among  British  statesmen  was,  that  commerce  could 
not  take  care  of  itself,  that  it  would  decay  under  the  influ- 
ence of  foreign  competition,  and  that  legislation  —  protec- 


98  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

tive  and  interfering  —  was  the  essential  thing  to  make  it 
prosperous.  Indeed,  it  was  considered  necessary  that  no 
Parliament  should  go  out  of  existence  until  it  had  enacted 
something  pertaining  to  the  regulation  and  encouragement 
of  trade  and  commerce.  "  I  pray  you,"  said  Charles  II.,  in 
one  of  his  speeches  to  Parliament,  "contrive  any  good  short 
bills  which  may  improve  the  industry  of  the  nation ;  and 
so,  God  bless  your  councils."  Mr.  Ricardo,  the  celebrated 
economist  and  author,  who  wrote  before  the  repeal  of  the 
navigation  laws,  in  commenting  on  this  state  of  things, 
used  the  following  language,  which  equally  well  applies  to 
the  existing  situation  in  the  United  States  :  "  All  increase 
of  shipping,"  he  says,  "  they  attributed  to  acts  of  Parlia- 
ment ;  none  to  increase  of  population  and  industry  and 
wealth  :  according  to  them,  all  good  is  the  result  of  restric- 
tion and  protection,  and  only  evil  springs  from  enterprise 
and  competition.  Experience  has  taught  them  nothing ; 
the  word  'protection'  has  so  mystified  and  deluded  them 
that  they  are  martyrs  to  it,  and  let  it  bind  them  down  to 
inferiority  and  decay." 

"  No  one,"  says  Mr.  W.  S.  Lindsay,  author  of  a  recent 
work  on  merchant  shipping,  "  can  rise  from  a  study  of 
these  laws  without  a  feeling  of  amazement  at  the  trouble 
our  ancestors  gave  themselves  to  '  beggar  their  neigh- 
bors '  under  the  erroneous  impression  which  too  long  pre- 
vailed, that  by  their  ruin  our  own  prosperity  would  be 
most  effectively  achieved.  It  is  therefore  not  surprising, 
that,  under  such  legislative  measures,  maritime  commerce 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  99 

was  for  centuries  slow  in  growth,  and  that  British  mer- 
chants and  ship-owners  frequently  suffered  quite  as  much 
through  the  instrumentality  of  laws  meant  for  their  pro- 
tection as  their  foreign  competitors  against  whom  these 
regulations  were  levelled."  l 

The  following  details  of  the  experience  of  British  trade 
and  commerce  under  these  laws  will  also  to  some  extent 
illustrate  their  absurdity  and  injurious  influence.  For 
example  :  — 

"  An  American  vessel  might  carry  American  cotton  to  England 
direct ;  but  if  such  cotton  was  landed  at  a  Continental  port  no  ship  of 

1  Per  contra  and  as  curiously  illustrative  of  how  persons  discussing  public 
questions  from  different  standpoints  can  deduce  diametrically  opposite  con- 
clusions from  the  same  data,  attention  is  asked  to  the  following  extract  from 
a  letter  written  by  a  leading  American  statesman,  in  1879,  to  certain  mer- 
chants of  New  York  City,  on  the  subject  of  the  decay  of  American  commerce, 
in  which  the  author  specially  antagonizes  the  views  of  McCulloch,  Buckle, 
and  Lindsay,  as  above  noticed  :  — 

"  Let  us  learn  wisdom  from  our  rivals.  Not  only  does  England  continue 
by  large  pecuniary  aids  to  stimulate  the  growth  of  her  steam  marine,  but 
from  the  days  of  Oliver  Cromwell  until  the  reign  of  Victoria  she  maintained 
the  most  rigid  protection  of  all  her  navigation  interests.  One  of  our  most 
intelligent  commercial  writers  and  statisticians  describes  and  embodies  the 
navigation  laws  of  England  in  words  that  are  always  worthy  to  be  quoted:  — 

"'The  laws  comprised  an  ingeniously  constructed  system  in  favor  of 
British  seamen,  British  ship-builders,  British  ship-owners,  and  British  mer- 
chants. The  maritime  code  of  Great  Britain  was  proudly  entitled  by  English- 
men "Charta  Maritima."  No  student  of  history  can  doubt  but  that  to  her 
navigation  laws  England  chiefly  owes  the  vast  extension  of  her  commerce, 
the  wonderful  development  of  her  national  wealth,  and  that  colonial  expan- 
sion which  gave  her  an  empire  upon  which  the  sun  never  sets.  Under  this 
protective  policy  her  power  upon  the  ocean  became  supreme.' " 


100  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.       . 

any  nationality  could  afterwards  land  it  for  consumption  in  England. 
The  grain  of  Russia,  if  once  landed  in  Prussia,  or  in  the  ports  of  any 
other  nation,  was  absolutely  shut  out  from  England,  no  matter  if  a 
deficiency  of  food  in  that  country  was  threatening  starvation  to  its 
people.  In  1839  tne  price  of  coffee  was  especially  high  in  the 
London  market.  Large  quantities  of  Java  and  Dutch  colonial  coffee  « 
were  in  store  in  Amsterdam,  but  it  could  not  be  brought  into  Eng- 
land because  it  had  been  landed  at  a  Continental  port.  Under  these 
circumstances  it  is  said  that  a  British  ship  was  chartered,  sent  to 
Amsterdam,  and  despatched  to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  where  the 
cargo  was  landed,  actually  or  constructively,  and  by  some  process 
recognized  by  the*  law  so  became  the  naturalized  produce  of  that 
colony.  It  was  then  carried  to  England,  and  coming  direct  from  a 
British  colony  in  a  British  ship  was  admitted  for  home  consumption. 
It  is  said  that  many  thousand  tons  of  merchandise  were  thus  sent 
cruising  half  round  the  globe,  involving  an  enormous  waste  of  capital, 
in  order  that  the  letter  of  the  law  might  be  fulfilled,  although  its 
spirit  was  nullified."  —  (Lindsay's  History  of  Merchant  Shipping: 
Hamilton  Hill.  American  Social  Science  Association,  1878.) 

British  legislators,  in  common  with  legislators  of  our 
own  day  and  nation,  were  unwilling  to  learn,  except  by 
experience ;  but,  after  five  centuries  of  experience  in  at- 
tempting to  promote  commerce  and  navigation  by  law, 
they  began  to  realize  that  the  general  effect  of  such  a 

1  In  the  United  States  at  present  (1882)  we  do  not  absolutely  forbid  the 
importation  of  Java  coffee  which  has  been  transported  to  Amsterdam  ;  but  we 
put  a  fine  of  ten  per  cent  of  the  value  of  the  coffee  —  i.e.,  extra  duty  —  if  any 
one  undertakes  to  do  such  an  improper  thing,  and  thus  achieve  practically 
the  same  result  as  was  reached  under  the  more  direct  and  stringent  British 
laws. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  IOF 

policy  was  injurious  and  not  beneficial.  This  feeling  first 
practically  manifested  itself  in  a  motion  in  Parliament,  in 
1847,  by  Mr.  Ricardo,  for  the  appointment  of  a  committee 
to  inquire  into  the  operation  and  policy  of  the  navigation 
laws ;  and,  although  strenuously  opposed,  the  motion  was 
adopted  by  a  vote  of  155  to  61.  The  committee  thus 
created,  owing  to  a  termination  of  the  session  before  they 
had  concluded  their  labors,  never  reported  ;  but  the  evi- 
dence taken  by  them,  and  placed  on  record,  abundantly 
proved  that  these  laws  failed  to  secure  superiority  either  in 
ships,  officers,  or  crews  ;  that  they  failed  to  secure  a  supply 
of  seamen  for  the  navy  ;  that  they  were  prejudicial  to  both 
British  foreign  and  colonial  trade ;  that  they  caused  the 
enactment  by  other  countries  of  similar  laws,  framed,  in 
part,  for  retaliation  ;.  and  that  they  did  not  secure  remunera- 
tive profits  to  the  ship-owner.  One  representative  witness, 
deputed  by  an  association  of  ship-owners  to  appear  before 
the  committee,  expressed  the  opinion  that  half  the  capital 
embarked  in  British  shipping  during  the  preceding  twenty- 
five  years  had  been  entirely  lost. 

There  was,  moreover,  a  special  stimulus  acting  on  the 
British  mind,  at  the  time  the  reform  movement  com- 
menced in  1849,  in  favor  of  a  more  liberal  maritime 
policy.  Ships  were  then  built  almost  exclusively  of  wood. 
The  United  States  could  build  cheaper  and  better  ships 
than  England,  because  the  advantage  in  the  material  and 
skill  for  building  was  with  them.  And  England,  recog- 
nizing this  fact,  felt  that  the  repeal  of  all  restrictions  in 


102  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  way  of  the  purchase  by  her  citizens,  of  American 
ships,  was  one  of  the  conditions  essential  to  enable  them 
to  meet  American  competition  on  the  ocean  on  any  thing 
like  equal  terms.  (How  the  United  States  failed  in  wisdom 
when  the  conditions  were  reversed,  has  already  been  pointed 
out.)  By  Act  of  Parliament,  therefore,  in  1849,  all  British 
navigation  laws  of  a  restrictive  character,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  such  as  pertained  to  the  coasting  trade,  were  re- 
pealed;  and,  in  1854,  the  British  coasting  trade  also  was 
thrown  open,  without  restriction,  to  the  participation  of 
all  nations.  The  reason  why  the  British  coasting  trade 
was  not  also  made  free  in  1849,  the  same  as,  and  in  con- 
nection with,  British  foreign  trade,  it  is  now  well  under- 
stood, was  because  of  the  unwillingness  of  the  United 
States  to  make  any  reciprocal  maritime  concessions. 

Although  long  discussed,  and  the  end,  to  some  extent, 
anticipated,  this  actual  abrogation  of  the  British  naviga- 
tion laws  finally  encountered  great  opposition  throughout 
the  kingdom  ;  and  predictions  were  freely  indulged  in  by 
such  men  as  Disraeli,  Lord  Brougham,  Lord  George 
Bentinck,  and  others,  that  henceforth  "free  trade  in 
shipping  would  destroy  the  ship-building  trade  of  Great 
Britain,  ruin  British  ship-owners,  and  drive  British  sailors 
into  foreign  vessels."  In  Liverpool  petitions  to  Parlia- 
ment against  the  repeal  received  27,000  signatures,  while  a 
counter-petition  received  only  1,400  signatures.  In  London 
the  petitions  against  repeal  received  23,000  signatures,  — 
Thomas  Baring  and  other  equally  influential  persons  head- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 03 

ing  the  list.  Some  leading  British  ship-owners,  seeing 
nothing  but  ruin  before  them,  sold  out  their  whole  ton- 
nage at  the  best  price  attainable  in  a  depressed  market, 
the  moment  that  it  became  evident  to  them  that  all 
attempts  to  further  perpetuate  the  navigation  laws  would 
be  useless.  In  the  House  of  Commons  Mr.  Disraeli 
concluded  a  long  attack  upon  the  first  bill  repealing  the 
British  navigation  laws,  in  the  following  words,  which 
would  seem  to  have  served  as  a  model  for  nearly  all 
the  statesmen  of  the  restrictive  school  in  the  United 
States  from  that  time  onward :  "  Will  you,  by  the  recol- 
lections of  your  past  prosperity,  by  the  memory  of  your 
still  existing  power,  for  the  sake  of  the  most  magnificent 
colonial  empire  in  the  world,  now  drifting  away  amid  the 
breakers,  for  the  sake  of  the  starving  mechanics  of  Bir- 
mingham and  Sheffield,  by  all  the  wrongs  of  a  betrayed 
agriculture,  by  all  the  hopes  of  Ireland,  will  you  not  rather, 
by  the  vote  we  are  now  coming  to,  arrive  at  a  decision 
which  may  to-morrow  smooth  the  careworn  countenance 
of  British  toil,  give  growth  and  energy  to  national  labor, 
and  at  least  afford  hope  to  the  tortured  industry  of  a 
suffering  people  ? "  And  he  closed  by  sarcastically  ob- 
serving that  "  he  would  not  sing  '  Rule  Britannia '  for  fear 
of  distressing  Mr.  Cobden,  but  he  did  not  think  the  House 
would  encore  'Yankee  Doodle.'  He  could  not  share  the 
responsibility  of  endangering  that  empire  which  extended 
beyond  the  Americas  and  the  farthest  Ind,  which  was 
foreshadowed  by  the  genius  of  Blake  and  consecrated  by 
the  blood  of  a  Nelson,  —  the  empire  of  the  seas." 


IO4  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

Lord  Stanley  (afterwards  Earl  Derby),  in  objecting  to 
the  proposal  to  admit  a  foreign-built  ship  to  British  regis- 
try, said,  "It was  essential  to  keep  up. the  number  and  effi- 
ciency of  our  private  building-yards,  which  would  speedily 
decrease  in  number  were  such  a  proposal  adopted." 

Admiral  Martin  testified  before  the  select  committee  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  "that  if  the  abrogation  of  the 
navigation  laws  left  the  [British]  ship-owner  at  liberty  to 
build  his  ships  in  foreign  countries,  and  he  availed  himself 
of  that  license,  it  would  inevitably  diminish  the  shipwright 
class  in  this  kingdom  ;  yet  on  this  class  the  safety  of  Eng- 
land greatly  depended."  Mr.  Walpole,  M.P.,  said  that, 
"whatever  gain  might  be  reaped  by  individuals,  the  repeal 
of  the  navigation  laws  would  imperil  the  safety  of  the 
country." 

Mr.  Drummond,  M.P.,  declared  "the  measure  to  be  the 
last  of  a  series  invented  by  the  Manchester  school,  the 
end  and  intention  of  which  were  to  discharge  all  British 
laborers,  and  to  employ  foreign  laborers  in  lieu" of  them,  — 
foreign  sawyers  instead  of  English  sawyers,  foreign  ship- 
wrights instead  of  English  shipwrights,  and  so  on  through 
the  whole  category  of  employments."  He  added  "that  if 
there  was  a  satanic  school  of  politics  this  was  certainly  it." 

The  Ship-owners'  Society  of  London,  in  one  of  these  ap- 
peals to  Parliament,  after  expressing  the  opinion  that  the 
maritime  greatness  of  England  depended  upon  the  main- 
tenance of  the  navigation  laws,  said  "that  if  these  laws 
were  abolished  'Rule  Britannia '  would  forever  be  expunged 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  10$ 

from  our  national  songs,  the  glories  of  Duncan  and  Nelson 
would  wither  like  the  aspen-leaf  and  fade  like  the  Tyrian 
dye,  and  none  but  Yankees,  Swedes,  Danes,  and  Nor- 
wegians could  be  found  in  our  ports.  Who  would  there 
be  to  fight  our  battles,  and  defend  our  sea-girt  shores?" 
Lord  Brougham  also  spoke  of  the  laws  that  it  was  pro- 
posed to  repeal,  as  having  long  been  considered  "  not  only 
as  the  foundation  of  our  glory  and  the  bulwark  of  our 
strength,  but  the  protection  of  our  very  existence  as  a 
nation." 

[NOTE.  —  We  fancy  some  of  our  readers  at  this  point  rubbing  their 
eyes,  and  asking  themselves  if  they  are  not  reading  from  the  columns 
of  some  of  the  leading  newspapers  of  the  United  States,  or  from  the 
speeches  of  men  who  have  been,  or  are  now,  influential  in  the  Federal 
Congress.] 

But  all  of  these  appeals  proved  powerless  to  prevent  the 
progress  of  reform,  and  common-sense  in  the  end  tri- 
umphed by  a  majority  of  fifty-six  in  the  Commons  and  ten 
in  the  House  of  Lords.  Sir  Robert  Peel,  in  closing  the  de- 
bate, met  the  predictions  of  disaster,  so  freely  indulged  in 
by  the  opponents  of  repeal,  by  showing  that  "the  same 
outcry  of  ruin  to  the  ship-owner,"  had  always  been  set  up 
whenever  any  measure  looking  to  the  unshackling  of  ocean 
trade  had  previously  been  proposed  ;  and  adverted  in  par- 
ticular to  the  circumstance  that  when  in  1782,  seventy 
years  previous,  it  was  proposed  to  admit  Ireland  to  par- 
ticipation in  the  colonial  trade,  the  ship-owners  of  Eng- 


106  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

land  prevented  it  on  the  ground  that  it  threatened  ruin 
to  their  interests,  and  that  those  of  Liverpool  in  a  peti- 
tion addressed  to  the  House  of  Commons  declared  "  that, 
if  any  such  thing  were  permitted,  Liverpool  must  be  inevit- 
ably reduced  to  its  original  insignificance." 

Experience  of  British  Skipping  subsequent  to  the  Repeal 
of  the  Navigation  Laws. 

Let  us  next  inquire  as  to  the  results  of  the  experience 
of  this  legislation,  and  how  far  the  prophecies  of  doom 
indulged  in  by  Disraeli,  Brougham,  and  Drummond  were 
realized.  From  1816  to  1840,  the  tonnage  of  the  United 
Kingdom  remained  almost  stationary,  increasing  during 
the  period  of  twenty-four  years  to  the  extent  of  only  80,- 
118  tons.  It  began,  however,  to  increase  immediately 
and  coincidently  with  the  removal  of  British  protective 
duties  in  1842,  and  gained  444,436  tons  between  1842  and 
1849.  After  the  repeal  of  the  navigation  laws  it  went  up 
from  3,485,958  in  1849, to  3.662,344  in  1851  ;  to  4,284,750 
in  1854;  to  4,806,826  in  1861  ;  to  5,694,123  in  1871 ;  and 
6,574,513  in  i88o.r  But  even  this  statement  fails  to  con- 
vey a  correct  idea  of  the  rapidity  of  growth  which  British 
commerce  has  experienced  since  the  shackles  for  so  many 
years  imposed  upon  it  by  the  navigation  laws  were  re- 
moved ;  for,  with  the  introduction  of  steam  as  a  motive 
power  for  vessels,  a  very  much  larger  amount  of  service 

1  For  the  entire  empire  the  aggregate  of  British  tonnage  is  estimated  at  a 
much  higher  figure. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  lO? 

is  performed  with  a  given  amount  of  tonnage  than  for- 
merly, thus  continually  diminishing  the  necessity  for  an 
absolutely  large  increase  of  tonnage.  For  a  full  under- 
standing, therefore,  of  what  has  actually  taken  place,  it  is 
necessary  to  couple  with  the  statement  of  the  absolute  in- 
crease of  British  tonnage  a  statement  of  the  increase  of 
tonnage  entering  or  clearing  the  ports  of  the  United  King- 
dom ;  which,  comparing  1840  with  1880,  has  risen  from 
6,490,485  tons  to  41,348,984  tons, — an  increase  of  over 
500  per  cent. 

The  statistics  of  the  entries  and  clearances  in  the  British 
foreign  trade  showed  an  increase  in  1860  of  10,000,000 
tons  over  1850;  12,000,000  in  1870  over  1860;  and  22,- 
000,000  in  1880  over  1870.  British  steam-tonnage  in- 
creased two  and  a  half  times  during  the  decade  of  1850-60, 
more  than  trebled  between  1860-70,  and  increased  two 
and  a  half  times  again  between  1870-8,0.  "I  am  not  ac- 
quainted with  any  national  industry,"  says  Mr.  John  Glover 
in  a  paper  on  "The  Progress  of  Shipping,"  read  before  the 
Statistical  Society  of  London,  February,  1882,  "of  which 
such  statements  could  be  made  on  the  authority  of  parlia- 
mentary returns."  Wooden  vessels,  according  to  the  same 
authority,  are  disappearing  from  the  British  register  at  the 
rate  of  about  a  thousand  vessels  each  year.  But,  for  every 
ton  of  effective  carrying  power  thus  lost,  seven  tons 
through  replacement  by  steamers,  it  is  estimated,  are 
gained.  Another  curious  fact  showing  the  immense  econ- 
omy of  steam,  brought  out  by  recent  investigations,  is,  that 


IO8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  enormously  increased  work  performed  by  the  British 
commercial  marine  in  1880  was  performed  by  fewer  hands 
than  were  employed  in  1870. 

The  proportion  of  foreign  vessels  engaged  in  the  foreign 
trade  of  Great  Britain  in  1850  —  the  year  next  after  the 
repeal  of  the  Navigation  Laws  —  was  32.2  percent;  during 
the  next  ten  years  it  increased,  and  was  41.9  per  cent  in 
1860;  in  1870  it  had  decreased  to  29.7 ;  and  in  1880  it  had 
fallen  to  27.8,  or  16.2  less  than  it  was  in  1850. 

As  has  been  already  noted,  the  restrictions  on  the  par- 
ticipation of  foreign  vessels  in  the  coasting  trade  of  Great 
Britain  were  not  removed  at  the  time  of  the  repeal  of  the 
navigation  laws  in  connection  with  foreign  trade  in  1849, 
but  were  continued  until  1856.  Much  apprehension  was 
even  then  felt  at  the  possible  effect  of  the  removal  of  the 
last  British  barrier  in  the  way  of  free  ocean  commerce  ; 
but  experience  soon  showed  that  freedom  was  no  less 
beneficial  in  the  smaller  sphere  of  its  application  than  it 
had  proved  in  the  larger.  The  British  coasting  trade,  as 
had  been  the  case  with  the  British  foreign  trade,  immedi- 
ately and  largely  increased  under  conditions  of  freedom  ; 
and,  while  foreign  vessels  at  once  and  for  the  first  time 
came  in  and  participated  in  it,  the  proportion  of  the  total 
business  transacted  by  British  vessels  was  greater  than 
ever  before,  and  the  superiority  once  established  has  never 
been  impaired. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  109 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE   DISCUSSION    OF    REMEDIES. 

HAVING  now  discussed  the  inception  and  primary  cause 
of  the  decay  of  American  shipping,  the  nature  and  influ- 
ence of  our  navigation  laws,  and  the  experience  of  other 
nations  —  our  business  competitors  —  during  the  period  of 
decay  under  consideration,  the  way  is  now  clear  for  a  con- 
sideration of  the  methods  and  feasibility  of  bringing  back 
and  using  ships  of  the  most  desirable  character  as  instru- 
mentalities for  the  profitable  employment  of  the  labor  and 
capital  of  the  United  States ;  and  as  aids  for  the  accom- 
plishment of  what  is  even  yet  more  important,  —  namely, 
the  creation  or  enlargement  of  markets  for  the  inevitable 
surplus  of  the  varied  products  of  our  industries ;  a  sur- 
plus which  threatens  at  no  distant  day  to  be  so  large,  and 
so  undisposable  through  lack  of  sufficient  foreign  markets, 
as  to  smother  us,  as  it  were,  in  our  own  grease. 

The  First  Step  in  the   Way  of  Recovery. 

And  first,  if  the  primary  cause  of  the  decline  of  Ameri- 
can shipping  employed  in  the  ocean  carrying  trade  was 
due  (as  beyond  all  question  it  was)  to  the  fact  that  Ameri- 
can ships  could  not  do  the  work  which  the  trade  and  com- 


I IO  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE, 

merce  of  the  world  required  to  have  done,  as  cheaply,  as 
expeditiously,  and  as  conveniently,  as  the  ships  of  Great 
Britain  and  other  competitive  maritime  nations;  if  the 
inception  of  this  decline  was  coincident  with  the  recogni- 
tion of  this  fact  by  American  and  foreign  merchants  ;  and 
if  the  same  causes  which  in  the  first  instance  arrested  the 
growth  and  occasioned  decay  in  American  ocean  tonnage 
have  ever  since  continued  and  are  now  operative,  —  then  it 
needs  no  argument  to  prove  that  the  first  step  to  be  taken 
in  the  way  of  recovery,  is  for  the  American  shipping  in- 
terest to  put  itself  on  a  par  with  its  foreign  competitors, 
in  respect  to  the  excellence  of  the  tools  or  instruments  — 
i.  e.,  the  ships  and  all  their  appurtenances  —  which  it 
needs  to  employ  in  the  transaction  of  its  business.  Un- 
less this  first  step  can  be  taken ;  unless  this  primary  and 
indispensable  result  can  be  effected,  there  is  no  use  of  fur- 
ther talking ;  and  we  might  as  well  fold  our  hands,  and 
complaisantly  say,  "  We  do  not  propose  to  be  a  maritime 
nation."  People  in  this  age  of  the  world  will  no  more 
continue  to  permanently  use  poor  or  unnecessarily  ex- 
pensive tools  in  trade  and  commerce,  than  they  will  in 
agriculture  and  manufactures.  They  will  either,  as  the 
outcome  of  intelligence,  voluntarily  adapt  themselves  to 
the  new  conditions  which  may  arise,  and  so  prosper  ;  or,  as 
the  outcome  of  ignorance  and  obstinacy,  adhere  to  the  old, 
and  be  crushed  and  starved  out  of  existence. 

The  inexpediency  of  denying  to  citizens  of  the  United 
States  the  right  to  employ  such  instrumentalities  in  their 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  Ill 

ocean  carrying  trade  as  may  to  them  seem  best,  or  essen- 
tial for  withstanding  competition,  would  find  an  exact 
illustration,  if  one  of  the  great  trunk  lines  of  railway  trav- 
ersing the  United  States  from  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi 
to  the  seaboard  —  say,  for  example,  the  New  York  Cen- 
tral—  should  by  reason  of  statute  regulations  be  con- 
strained to  offer  inferior  accommodations,  or  establish 
comparatively  higher  rates  of  freights  and  fares  than  the 
Pennsylvania  Central.  Under  such  circumstances,  it  is 
evident  that  the  former  would  inevitably  lose  its  business, 
and  decay,  and  that  no  legislation  or  appeal  to  the  State 
pride  of  the  merchants  of  New  York  in  favor  of  their  own 
State  road  would  prevent  the  decay. 

Again,  if  a  man  proposing  to  build  a  house  were  told 
that  he  must  buy  his  bricks  or  timber  in  his  own  town  or 
State,  rather  than  in  some  other  town  or  State,  and  that 
he  would  in  the  long-rim  suffer  no  loss  by  so  doing,  his 
answer  would  probably  be,  that  he  individually  could 
judge  of  that  matter  better  than  any  one  else,  and  that 
the  only  sensible  way  of  deciding  the  question  would  be 
to  leave  it  to  him  to  decide."  If  at  the  same  time  he  was 
asked  to  contribute  to  a  fund  to  maintain  the  business  of 
brick  and  lumber  manufacture  in  his  own  town  or  State, 
because  he  desired  to  use  bricks  and  lumber  in  the  con- 
struction of  a  house,  he  would  soon  realize  that  the  whole 
system  of  regulating  his  affairs  in  accordance  with  the 
wishes  of  the  brick  and  lumber  makers  was  not  only  an 
encroachment  on  his  rights,  but  an  almost  insuperable 


112  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

barrier  in  the  way  of  the  development  of  his  business  or 
interests.  And  yet  our  merchants  contentedly  listen 
with  patience,  year  after  year,  to  statements  in  respect  to 
the  development  of  our  foreign  commerce,  by  administra- 
tors of  the  government,  whose  theories  and  arguments 
are  inconsistent  with  the  teachings  of  the  most  ordinary 
and  every-day  experience. 

At  this  period,  furthermore,  when  the  whole  tendency 
of  trade  and  commerce  is  to  transact  business  for  the  min- 
imum of  profit  on  separate  transactions,  and  to  aggregate 
and  increase  profits  by  increasing  the  number  of  transac- 
tions or  the  volume  of  business,  it  does  not  require  any 
large  inequality  in  the  way  of  either  profit  or  loss,  as  re- 
spects different  methods,  to  determine  great  commercial 
results.  Railroad  men  have  found  out,  for  example,  that 
so  small  a  matter  apparently  as  the  civility  or  neglect  of 
conductors,  or  the  scarcity  or  abundance  of  towels  on 
sleeping-cars,  will  sensibly  influence  the  volume  of  travel ; 
and  the  question  as  to  whether  the  United  States  or  Great 
Britain  shall  control  an  export  trade  of  some  five  thou- 
sand millions  of  yards  of  cotton  cloth,  is  said  by  those 
who  are  authority,  to  turn  on  a  difference  in  comparative 
cost  of  less  than  a  quarter  of  a  cent  a  yard.  We  start, 
therefore,  in  this  discussion  of  the  feasibility  of  arrest- 
ing the  decay  of  American  shipping,  and  promoting  its 
growth,  with  the  axiom  that  if  the  United  States  pro- 
poses to  compete  for  the  carrying  trade  of  the  ocean,  or 
expects  to  carry  any  considerable  proportion  even  of  its 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  113 

own  exports  and  imports,  it  must  provide  itself  at  the  out- 
set with  ships  in  every  respect  as  good  and  as  cheap  as 
those  which  its  competitors  for  similar  service  offer  for 
employment.  The  United  States  at  present,  it  is  admit- 
ted, has  no  such  vessels ;  and  the  question  that  next  pre- 
sents itself  is,  How  shall  they  be  procured  ?  and  the  an- 
swer is,  Build  or  buy,  —  one  of  the  two,  —  or  go  without, 

If  we  could  construct  ships  in  every  respect  adequate  to 
meet  the  requirements  of  the  age,  —  cost  as  well  as  quality 
being  taken  into  account,  —  public  sentiment  would  be 
unanimous  in  favor  of  doing  it  in  preference  to  adopting 
any  other  policy. '  But  under  existing  circumstances  we 
cannot  do  it.  Certain  persons,  assuming  to  speak  with 
authority,  have  from  time  to  time,  within  the  last  few 
years,  publicly  asserted  to  the  contrary ;  but  the  fact  that 
only  two  iron  sailing-vessels  have  been  built  in  the  United 
States  within  the  last  ten  years  (1872-82),  and  these  of 
only  44  and  36  tons  burden  respectively,  —  hardly  large 
enough  for  an  oyster  craft,  — and  that  the  trifling  amount 
of  iron  steam-tonnage  constructed  within  the  same  period 
has  been  merely  to  meet  the  wants  of  the  coasting  trade, 
which  is  forbidden  by  law  to  otherwise  supply  itself,  suffi- 
ciently prove  the  falsity  of  any  such  averment.  What 
better  testimony  under  this  head,  moreover,  could  be 
asked  than  that  furnished  by  the  experience  of  the  line  of 
transatlantic  steamships  established  some  years  ago  under 
the  auspices  and  by  the  contributions  of  the  Pennsylvania 
Central  Railroad,  to  run  between  Philadelphia  and  Liver- 


1 14  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

pool ;  the  only  transatlantic  steamship  company  which  at 
present  (1882)  carries  the  flag  of  the  United  States,  but 
which  it  is  now  proposed  by  the  subsidizing  railroad  to 
discontinue.1  At  the  outset  this  company  proposed  to 
use  only  steamers  of  American  construction,  and  did  pro- 
vide itself  with  four  vessels  of  this  character.  But  subse- 
quently (1880),  finding  itself  in  need  of  new  steamships, 
it  quietly  discarded  Pennsylvania's  pet  theories  about 
American  industry  and  employment  of  home  labor,  and, 
being  forbidden  to  buy  abroad,  concluded  to  hire  abroad, 
and  so  supplied  its  necessities. 

Disuse  of  Wooden  and  Sailing   Vessels. 

Wooden  vessels  are  things  of  the  past,  and  all  the 
facilities  which  may  be  claimed  for  the  United  States  in 
respect  to  the  construction  of  such  vessels  will  therefore 
count  for  nothing.  If,  in  the  future  revision  of  our  nav- 
igation laws  in  favor  of  the  free  purchase  and  ownership 
of  ships,  wooden  vessels  should  be  excepted,  and,  with  a 
view  of  especially  pleasing  certain  ship-building  interests 
in  Maine  and  other  New  England  States,  a  provision 

1  "  The  financial  results  of  the  American  Steamship  Company  since  the 
commencement  of  its  operations,  and  the  necessity  for  large  outlays  for  its 
future  maintenance,  have  caused  your  Board  to  doubt  the  propriety  of 
further  diverting  your  revenues  to  that  purpose ;  and  to  consider  the 
question  whether  all  that  could  reasonably  be  asked  of  your  Company  on 
behalf  of  the  commercial  interests  of  this  port  has  not  been  more  than  per- 
formed, and  whether  the  promotion  of  steamship  lines  should  not  be  left  to 
private  enterprise."  —  Report  Penn.  Central  R.  R.,  March,  1882. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  115 

should  be  enacted  that  no  citizen  of  the  United  States 
should  hereafter  purchase  or  own  a  wooden  vessel  of  for- 
eign construction,  under  penalty  of  death,  no  American 
who  proposes  to  use  ships  as  instrumentalities  of  com- 
merce would  make  the  slightest  manifestation  of  protest, 
except  against  the  combined  uselessness  and  absurdity  of 
the  proposition. 

It  is  idle,  therefore,  to  expect  relief  to  our  shipping 
interests  by  the  further  fostering  of  the  construction  of 
wooden  vessels.  About  a  million  and  a  quarter  of  Ameri- 
can wooden  sailing-tonnage  is  reported  as  yet  engaged  in 
foreign  trade  ;  but  it  needs  no  prophetic  gift  to  foresee 
that  it  is  doomed  to  continuous  loss,  and  destined  at  no 
distant  day  to  rot  at  our  wharves.  In  foreign  trade  our 
wooden  sailing-vessels  have  of  late  found  little  opportunity 
for  employment,  except  for  the  carriage  of  the  mineral 
oils.  In  the  coasting  business  they  still  maintain  a  place, 
principally  as  carriers  of  lumber,  coal,  and  other  coarse 
freights ;  but  even  in  this  field  they  are  every  day  finding 
it  more  and  more  difficult  to  compete  with  steam.  In  the 
foreign  lumber  trade  of  the  British  Provinces,  steamers 
are  rapidly  supplanting  the  wooden  sailing-vessels  ;  and  no 
fewer  than  twenty,  some  of  them  of  nearly  2,000  tons  bur- 
den, are  now  engaged  in  the  transportation  of  lumber  from 
the  port  of  St.  John,  N.B.  Again,  until  within  a  few  years 
past,  small  wooden  sailing-vessels  have  managed  to  retain 
a  profitable  carrying  trade  between  the  United  States  and 
the  West  Indies  and  South  America.  A  majority  of 


Il6  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

these  vessels  were  schooners  and  brigantines  of  about  120 
tons  register ;  some  of  them  expensively  fitted  up,  and  de- 
signed not  only  to  carry  large  cargoes,  but  also  passen- 
gers. As  soon,  however,  as  the  swift,  cheaply  manned, 
British  iron  steamer  came  into  this  field,  the  American  sail- 
ing-vessels began  to  disappear,  as  if  by  magic ;  and  along 
with  the  vessels  necessarily  goes  no  inconsiderable  part  of 
the  commerce  which  they  represented.  Out  of  an  export 
and  import  trade  between  the  United  States  and  Vene- 
zuela in  1880,  of  $8,307,000  valuation,  only  $3,015,000  was 
conveyed  in  American  bottoms.  The  manufacture  of 
wooden  vessels  in  the  United  States  is  to-day  principally 
confined  to  schooners,  sloops,  yachts,  pilot-boats,  and 
other  small  craft.  West  of  Maine,  the  building  of  wooden 
vessels  has  practically  ceased  on  our  ocean  coasts,  a  cir- 
cumstance that  has  to  some  extent  stimulated  this  busi- 
ness in  the  above-mentioned  State.  In  the  British  Prov- 
inces a  like  decadence  of  wooden  sail-tonnage  is  also 
noticeable,  and  the  colonial  ship-yards  are  seriously  con' 
templating  the  abandonment  of  wood  for  iron.  In  Great 
Britain  wood  has  almost  entirely  ceased  to  be  a  factor  in 
marine  construction. 

The  advantage  of  iron  over  wooden  sailing  vessels  is 
shown  by  the  circumstance,  that  the  former  secure  a 
higher  classification  for  a  longer  term  of  years,  are  main- 
tained at  less  expense,  carry  more  cargo  than  a  wooden 
ship  with  an  equal  displacement  up  to  the  construction 
water-line,  obtain  higher  rates  of  freights,  and  even  at 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 1/ 

the  enhanced  rates  command  the  preference  of  shippers. 
The  main  reason  of  these  last  advantages  is  to  be  found 
in  the  difference  in  the  rates  of  insurance  in  favor  of  the 
iron  vessel,  and  in  the  less  liability  of  damage  to  the  car- 
goes by  them  transported. 

Snpersedurc  of  Sail  by  Steam. 

But,  be  the  advantage  of  iron  over  wooden  ships  greater 
or  less  (and  on  this  point  authorities  are  not  fully  agreed), 
it  is  all  but  universally  conceded,  that,  except  for  very  long 
voyages  with  bulky  freights,  iron  sailing-vessels  have  also 
had  their  day,  and  will  be  displaced  as  rapidly  as  steamers 
can  be  built  in  substitute.  Thus  for  the  year  1880  the 
building  of  steamers  in  Great  Britain  as  compared  with 
sailing-tonnage  (mainly  iron)  was  as  6  to  I  ;  and,  while 
during  the  same  year  the  sailing-vessel  tonnage  of  the 
United  Kingdom  diminished  to  the  extent  of  217,000 
tons,  the  steam-tonnage  was  increased  by  212,000  tons. 
The  loss  of  sailing-vessel  tonnage  from  the  British  register 
during  the  decade  1870-80  has  been  estimated  at  750,000 
tons.  It  was  replaced,  however,  by  an  increase  of  1,611,- 
534  steamer  tons,  with  about  fivefold  increase  in  carrying 
capacity. 

The  following  illustration,  drawn  from  the  statistics  of 
the  carrying  trade  between  the  Argentine  Republic  of 
South  America  and  Europe,  also  furnishes  a  striking  illus- 
tration of  the  rapidity  with  which  sail  is  being  supplanted 
by  steam,  even  in  a  business  in  which  the  carriage  one 


Il8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

way  is  composed  almost  exclusively  of  exceedingly  bulky 
articles  as  compared  with  their  weight,  such  as  wool,  hair, 
hides,  and  sheep-skins.  Thus  in  1870  this  trade  was 
conducted  through  the  agency  of  104  steamers  of  144,252 
tons,  and  1,142  sailing-vessels  of  347,304  tons.  In  1878 
the  number  of  steamers  had  increased  to  244  with  362,542 
tonnage,  while  the  number  of  sailing-vessels  had  de- 
creased to  547  with  only  210,634  tonnage.  Again:  In 
1880,  out  of  the  113,343,000  bushels  of  grain  exported 
from  New  York,  49,966,000  bushels  were  transported  by 
1,292  steamers,  and  63,376,000  by  1,789  sailing-vessels. 
In  1 88 1  the  shipments  of  grain  from  the  same  port 
were  72,276,000  bushels  ;  of  which  53,265,000  (a  gain  of 
3,289,000)  were  carried  by  1,302  steamers,  and  only 
19,020,000  (a  loss  of  44,356,000)  by  554  sailing-vessels. 

But  the  steamship  of  ten  years  ago  will  not  answer  the 
requirements  of  the  present  day.  Steamers  of  recent 
construction  have  been  greatly  lengthened,  increasing 
their  capacity  for  freight  without  proportionally  augment- 
ing the  cost  of  moving  them.  The  space  which  the  en- 
gines and  coal  take  up  has  been  decreased  largely,  thus 
adding  to  the  room  for  freight.  Compound  engines  with 
surface  condensers  and  high  measures  of  expansion  are 
superseding  the  engines  of  former  pattern,  while  the 
special  feature  of  British  ship-building  during  the  past 
two  years  has  been  the  rapid  substitution  of  steel  in  the 
place  of  iron  for  the  construction  of  vessels.  If  the  Brit- 
ish anticipations  of  advantage  from  the  application  of 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 19 

steel  should  be  in  even  a  moderate  degree  realized,  the 
fact  is  a  matter  of  no  little  significance  in  its  bearing  on 
the  problem  under  discussion ;  for  the  unquestionably 
superior  facilities  which  England  now  enjoys  for  pro- 
ducing cheap  steel  in  large  quantities  would  render  com- 
petition with  her  in  ship-building  in  the  immediate  future 
far  more  formidable  than  it  is  at  present.1 

Ship-using    rather  than    Ship-construction   the  Object   of 
Primary  Importance  to  the  United  States. 

In  determining  under  these  circumstances  what  is  the 
best  policy  for  the  United  States  to  pursue,  it  is  all-im- 
portant to  endeavor  to  realize  fully  at  the  outset,  and  keep 
clearly  in  view  throughout  the  whole  of  this  discussion, 
the  end  and  object  of  primary  importance  in  the  way  of 
attainment ;  and  that  is,  not  so  much  the  promotion  of 

1  A  recent  English  writer,  in  treating  upon  the  new  application  of  steel  to 
ship-building,  illustrates  the  advantage  of  this  material  over  iron  as  follows  : 
Suppose  the  construction  of  a  transatlantic  freight  steamer,  carrying  3,500 
tons  (dead  weight),  is  contemplated:  "if  of  iron,  the  hull  will  weigh  about 
2,500  tons,  and  the  entire  ship  will  cost  about  $350,000 ;  of  steel,  the  hull 
will  weigh  2,000  tons,  the  total  cost  being  $380,000.  Reckoning  6  per  cent 
interest  and  6  per  cent  depreciation,  etc.,  on  this  $30,000  extra  cost,  we  have 
$3,600  per  annum.  As  an  offset  to  this  the  writer  estimates  as  an  extra 
freight  on  the  steel  over  the  iron  vessel  500  tons  cargo  out  and  500  tons 
back.  Assuming  ten  trips  per  year,  this  would  give  10,000  tons  extra  freight, 
which,  at  $3  average  freight  per  ton,  would  give  $30,000  extra  earnings  per 
year.  Deducting  from  this  the  $3,600,  the  balance  of  $26,400  represents  the 
extra  net  profit  per  year  that  would  be  earned  by  the  steel  over  the  iron 
steamship,  which  is  equal  to  9}  per  cent  on  the  entire  cost  of  the  vessel." 


120  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  business  of  ship-construction,  as  that  of  reclaiming 
and  repossessing  that  share  in  the  immense  and  profitable 
business  of  the  ocean  transport  of  freight  and  passengers 
which  we  formerly  possessed,  and  which  as  a  nation  of 
the  first  rank  we  are  entitled  to  have ;  and  which,  further- 
more, we  must  have  if  we  would  enjoy  sufficient  markets 
for  the  products  of  our  industries,  and  sufficient  opportu- 
nity for  the  profitable  employment  of  our  labor.  Hitherto 
this  distinction  has  not  been  appreciated  as  fully  as  it 
ought  to  have  been  ;  and  mainly  for  the  reason  that  in- 
tentional and  persistent  efforts  have  been  and  are  now 
constantly  being  made  to  befog  the  whole  subject,  and 
make  it  appear  that  the  interest  of  a  few  persons  engaged 
in  building  ships  is  the  first  thing  to  be  considered : 
while  in  truth,  important  and  desirable  as  is  the  business 
of  American  ship-building,  it  is  most  insignificant  in  com- 
parison with  the  important  results  that  are  certain  to 
accrue  to  national  wealth  from  successful  ship-owning  and 
ship-using. 

Suppose  Congress  should  be  induced  to  appropriate 
$2,000,000  to  $3,000,000  to  call  into  existence  two  or 
three  lines  of  steamers  to  run  in  competition  with  non- 
subsidized  foreign  steamers,  say  between  New  York  and 
Liverpool ;  their  total  earnings  would  not  amount  to  more 
than  2k  per  cent  of  the  amount  which  the  United  States 
now  annually  pays  to  foreigners  for  carrying  our  exports 
and  imports.  In  fact,  the  clamor  which  a  few  individual 
owners  of  ship-yards  are  making,  and  the  effort  that  is 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  121 

being  made  by  others  to  have  it  appear  that  their  interest 
in  this  matter  is  paramount,  forcibly  recalls  Patrick 
Henry's  famous  old  story  of  John  Hook  disturbing  the 
American  camp  with  hoarse  cries  of  "  Beef !  beef ! "  be- 
cause it  had  been  found  expedient  to  take  two  of  his 
steers  in  order  to  rescue  the  Continental  soldiers  from 
starvation.  There  was  no  doubt  that  John  Hook  had  lost 
his  steers,  and  that  he  ought  to  have  been  paid  for  them  ; 
but  this  did  not  prevent  the  people  (according  to  William 
Wirt,  the  biographer  of  Patrick  Henry)  from  proposing  to 
tar-and-fcather  him  for  impudently  demanding  that  his 
petty  claim,  rather  than  the  condition  of  the  army,  should 
first  receive  attention. 

The  Policy  of  Common- Sense  and  of  Experience. 

Viewing,  then,  the  case  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
relative  importance  of  the  several  involved  interests,  and 
preferring  the  greater  interest  to  the  less,  the  policy 
which  would  seem  to  be  in  accordance  with  all  true  busi- 
ness principles  and  also  with  common-sense,  would  be  for 
the  government  to  promptly  allow  every  citizen  of  the 
United  States  who  desired  to  purchase  and  use  ships,  to 
freely  exercise  his  own  judgment  in  respect  to  sources  of 
supply,  and  not  attempt  to  dictate  to  him,  either  directly  or 
indirectly,  what  kind  of  ships  he  shall  use,  where  he  shall 
buy,  or  how  much  he  shall  pay  for  them.  And  in  recom- 
mendation of  this  policy  it  should  be  also  borne  in  mind 
that  the  nation  is  not  asked  to  walk  in  any  new  and  un- 


122  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

tried  path,  but  upon  a  course  whose  every  step  is  bril- 
liantly illuminated  by  experience.  Thus,  for  example,  it 
has  always  been  the  custom  of  New-England  manufac- 
turers, whose  orthodoxy  in  respect  to  the  protective  doc- 
trine has  never  been  questioned,  if  at  any  time  they  hear 
of  a  new  machine  invented  or  brought  into  use  in  Europe, 
for  more  effective  spinning  or  weaving,  for  the  carding  of 
wool,  or  the  printing  of  cloths,  or  of  any  new  dye,  to  imme- 
diately send  and  get  it ;  and  keep  sending  and  supplying 
themselves  until  American  mechanics  and  chemists,  find- 
ing a  demand  existing  for  the  new  product,  commence  to 
supply  it :  working  tentatively  in  the  first  instance,  using 
the  foreign  article  as  a  model  or  guide,  and  finally  result- 
ing, in  most  instances,  in  the  production  of  something 
better  and  cheaper  than  the  original.  And  to  such  an 
extent  has  this  policy  found  favor,  that  Congress  in  re- 
peated instances  has  provided  that  new  and  improved 
instrumentalities  of  production  of  foreign  origin  and  con- 
struction may  be  imported  free  of  all  restriction  or  duty ; 
as  has  been  the  case  with  machinery  for  steam  ploughing, 
for  propelling  canal-boats,  for  making  beet  sugar,  for  the 
spinning  of  jute,  and  the  like.  It  is  obvious  that  the 
principle  conceded  in  this  legislation  is  identical  with  that 
involved  in  the  proposed  concession  of  the  privilege  to 
freely  import  ships ;  namely,  the  desire  to  create  or  de- 
velop a  domestic  industry  through  the  free  importation  of 
such  instrumentalities  as  are  necessary  for  its  successful 
prosecution,  and  which  instrumentalities  at  the  same  time 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  12$ 

cannot     advantageously     be    obtained     in     the     United 
States.1 

Such  also  was  the  policy  adopted  by  Great  Britain  in 
1849  (when  the  United  States  had  demonstrated  its  superi- 
ority in  the  construction  of  wooden  vessels),  by  repealing 
her  navigation  laws  and  allowing  her  merchants  and  sear 
men  to  freely  purchase  and  use  the  superior  American  ves- 
sels. Such  also  was  the  course  adopted  at  a  later  period 
by  every  maritime  nation  of  Europe  when  English  supe- 
riority in  the  construction  of  iron  vessels  and  steam  ma- 
chinery was  demonstrated ;  and  in  no  one  instance  has  the 
result  been  other  than  highly  advantageous  to  the  pur- 
chasing parties  and  in  justification  of  the  liberal  policy. 
The  experience  of  Germany  in  this  connection  is  exceed- 
ingly interesting  and  instructive.  But  comparatively  few 
years  ago  "  there  was  not  a  machine-shop  or  a  building- 
yard  for  iron  ships  at  either  of  the  two  great  ports  of  Ger- 
many, —  Hamburg  and  Bremen.  They  possessed  a  few 
small  ships  and  barks  in  the  foreign  trade,  but  most  of 
their  tonnage  consisted  of  galliots  and  fishing-smacks 
which  navigated  the  North  Sea ;  and  it  is  doubtful  if  they 


1  An  attempt  has  been  made  to  weaken  the  force  of  this  illustration  by 
asserting  that  in  each  instance  in  which  permission  for  the  free  importation 
of  machinery  has  been  granted  by  Congress,  it  has  been  difficult  or  impossi- 
ble to  reproduce  it  in  the  United  States  without  a  working  pattern.  The 
assertion  is,  however,  an  absurdity,  inasmuch  as  there  is  never  any  difficulty 
in  obtaining  models,  working-drawings,  and  specifications  of  any  article 
offered  for  sale  in  a  foreign  market 


124  OUR   MERCHANT  MARINE. 

had  a  dozen  captains  or  officers  who  were  qualified  to  take 
command  of  a  steamship.  But  they  had  something  which 
we  had  not,  —  the  liberty  to  avail  themselves  as  best  they 
could  of  the  new  improvements  of  the  age.  They  were 
quick  to  seize  upon  it.  They  went  to  the  Clyde,  and 
ordered  steamships  to  be  built :  they  educated  their  coast- 
ing and  fishing  skippers  to  the  standard  required  for  com- 
manding these,  and  then  took  to  themselves  the  whole 
transatlantic  steamship  business  (i.e.,  between  Germany 
and  the  United  States),  out  of  which  our  government 
defrauded  its  long-established  commercial  houses,  its  edu- 
cated ship-masters  and  hardy  seamen.  The  Germans  still 
keep  that  trade,  and  each  succeeding  year  increase  it, 
until  their  flag  is  known  in  every  considerable  seaport  on 
the  Western  Continent,  as  well  as  in  the  Mediterranean 
and  the  isles  of  the  Indian  and  Pacific  Oceans.  What  an 
impetus  has  been  given  by  our  supineness  to  the  com- 
mercial prosperity  of  Germany  !  And  have  the  ship-yards 
of  Bremen  and  Hamburg  suffered  any  loss  thereby  ? 
Thousands  of  people  besides  the  owners  and  crews  of 
these  steamships  have  been  benefited  ;  and  to-day  there  are 
some  of  these  thousands  employed  in  German  ship-yards 
and  machine-shops  which  would  not  have  had  an  exist- 
ence but  for  the  liberal  policy  of  the  German  government. 
In  these  establishments,  first  made  necessary  for  repairing 
the  fleet  purchased  for  the  use  of  their  commerce  and 
employment  of  their  seamen,  they  have  now  begun  the 
building  of  iron  steamships  (one  in  1881  for  the  Chinese 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  12$ 

•navy) ;  gaining  experience  by  their  opportunities  for  ac- 
quiring knowledge  in  mechanical  construction,  and  thus 
setting  an  example  from  which  we  might  profit."  t 

Again,  during  the  Russian  (Crimean)  war  of  1853-56, 
the  Russian  mercantile  marine  was  said  to  have  been 
entirely  destroyed  ;  but  during  the  four  years  next  subse- 
quent to  the  termination  of  the  war  —  or  between  1856 
and  1860  —  Russia,  with  the  aid  of  her  former  enemy, 
repaired  her  losses  so  rapidly  that  the  amount  of  her  ton- 
nage entering  British  ports  in  1860  was  48  per  cent  more 
than  in  1850.  Had  the  Russians  depended  on  their  own 
efforts,  and  through  national  prejudice  refused  the  co- 
operation of  England,  would  any  such  result  have  been 
possible  ?  And  later,  when  Louis  Napoleon,  who  as  Em- 
peror of  the  French  cannot  be  charged  with  any  lack  of 
national  sentiment,  desired  to  call  into  existence  a  Franco- 
American  line  of  steamships  which  should  cope  with  the 
great  English  lines  running  to  New  York,  he  did  not  con- 
sider that  he  compromised  himself  or  his  people  in  any 
way  by  contracting  for  the  building  of  the  pioneer  ships 
"  Ville  de  Paris  "  and  "  Pereire  "  on  the  Clyde. 

And,  finally,  we  find  the  Chinese  coming  late  to  the 
appreciation  of  the  desirability  of  having  a  commercial 
marine  of  the  most  improved  construction,  and  at  the 
same  time  recognizing  that  they  had  no  such  vessels,  or 
the  means  for  constructing  them.  Under  such  circum- 

1  Capt.  Codman,  International  Review,  February,  1881. 


126  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

stances,  what  was  the  policy  of  this  most  sagacious,  exclu- 
sive, self-reliant  people  ?  They  interposed  no  obstacles 
in  the  way  of  the  purchase  by  their  merchants  of  such 
ships  of  foreign  construction  as  seemed  best  suited  to 
their  necessities ;  but  at  the  same  time  they  encouraged 
and  commenced  the  home  construction  of  vessels  of  the 
European  type,  iron-clads  as  well  as  merchant  vessels. 
And  under  the  influence  of  this  sound  policy,  the  Chinese 
commercial  and  naval  fleet  has  already  become  one  of  no 
small  magnitude  and  importance. 

In  face,  now,  of  all  these  lessons  of  experience,  can  it 
be  doubted  that  had  Russia,  France,  Germany,  and  China 
pursued  a  policy  contrary  to  what  they  did  adopt,  the 
state  of  their  mercantile  marine  would  now  be  in  a  con- 
dition of  depression  akin  to  what'  exists  in  the  United 
States,  and  that  the  business  of  the  commercial  marine 
of  Great  Britain  would  to  a  corresponding  extent  have 
been  increased  ?  And  could  there  be  any  thing  more  akin 
to  stark  idiocy  and  insanity  than  for  a  man  to  stand  up, 
as  did  one  of  the  delegates  from  New  York  City  to  the 
Boston  Shipping  Convention  in  1880,  and  assert  "that 
the  entire  movement  [in  the  United  States]  in  favor  of 
free  ships  was  in  the  interest  of  the  British  Government, 
and  that  the  press  received  pay  from  the  other  side  of  the 
ocean  to  advocate  this  policy  in  order  that  all  the  Ameri- 
can ships  might  be  bought  out "  ? x 

1  Report  of  Proceedings,  Boston  Journal. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  I2/ 

One  further  illustration  under  this  head.  — Would  it  not 
be  regarded  as  the  height  of  folly  for  a  railway  company 
like  the  New  York  Central,  for  example,  with  a  press  of 
profitable  business  continually  offering,  to  decline  to  re- 
new or  increase  its  equipment  of  cars  and  engines  until 
the  same  could  be  constructed  by  State  artisans  and  in 
State  machine-shops,  and  for  the  sole  reason  that  any 
other  plan  for  supplying  the  wants  of  trade  would  neces- 
sitate purchases  from  other  artisans  and  other  machine- 
shops  localized  in  other  States,  and  so  be  repugnant  to 
State  sentiments  or  traditions  ?  And  if  some  of  these 
other  States  should  happen  to  be  foreign,  rather  than 
domestic,  would  that  alone  suffice  to  convert  a  policy  of 
confessed  foolishness  to  one  worthy  of  commendation  ? 


128  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

Objections  to  the  Repeal  of  our  Navigation  Laws  stated 
and  considered. 

THE  objections  urged  in  opposition  to  the  repeal  of  the 
navigation  laws  of  the  United  States,  or  to  the  granting 
of  permission  to  American  citizens  to  purchase  and  use 
ships  of  foreign  construction  without  restriction  if  they 
should  consider  it  their  interest  to  do  so,  may  be  summar- 
ized under  the  following  heads  :  — 

First,  That  it  would  fundamentally  violate  the  great 
doctrine  of  "  Protection,"  which  is  at  present  adopted  as 
the  policy  of  the  United  States ;  and  that  it  would  be 
unjust  to  withdraw  from  the  domestic  ship-building  inter- 
est that  protection  against  foreign  competition  which  is 
theoretically  extended  to  every  other  mechanical  industry 
of  the  country. 

Second,  That  the  end  in  view,  namely,  the  arrest  of  the 
decadence  of  American  shipping,  and  its  restoration  to 
prosperity,  can  be  attained  through  a  system  of  bounties 
or  subsidies  equally  well,  or  better,  than  by  a  repeal  of 
the  navigation  laws. 

Third,  That  a  repeal  of  the  navigation  laws  will  not 
accomplish  the  desired  result. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 29 

Repeal  of  the  Navigation  Laws  a  Measure  of  True  Pro- 
tection for  American  Industry. 

Under  the  first  head  it  is  to  be  remarked,  that  even 
accepting  to  the  fullest  degree  the  fundamental  principle 
of  the  doctrine  of  protection  to  home  industry,  namely, 
that  Government  should  interfere  by  law  to  put  American 
capital  and  labor  as  nearly  as  possible  on  the  same  foot- 
ing as  European  capital  and  labor,  the  proposition  to 
allow  American  citizens  to  purchase  ships  of  foreign  con- 
struction to  be  used  in  the  ocean  carrying  trade  ought  to 
be  received  with  favor.  Ships  suitable  to  meet  the  pres- 
ent requirements  of  trade  and  commerce,  and  constructed 
in  American  ship-yards,  cost  at  present  from  30  to  40 
per  cent  more  than  similar  vessels  constructed  in  Great 
Britain.  It  is  unnecessary  to  here  inquire  as  to  the 
causes  of  this  difference ;  but  only  to  recognize  and  accept 
the  fact,  and  also  that  there  is  no  reason  to  think  that 
the  cause  will  be  speedily  removed.  To  expect  that 
under  such  circumstances  American  ships  can  compete 
with  foreign  vessels  in  the  same  sphere  of  employment,  is 
as  idle  as  to  expect  that  a  man  with  his  feet  in  a  sack  can 
compete  in  a  race  with  one  whose  limbs  are  free  and  un- 
shackled. It  cannot  be  done.  The  maritime  countries  of 
the  world  which  will  do  the  business  wJiich  the  world 
requires  to  be  done  upon  the  ocean  cheapest  will  get  and 
keep  the  business  ;  and  if  we  would  now  retrace  our  steps, 
and  get  back  what  we  have  commercially  lost,  or  rather 


130  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

have  thrown  away  by  our  amazing  folly  and  short-sighted- 
ness, we  have  got  to  keep  this  one  point  primarily  and 
steadily  in  view,  and  make  it  the  basis  of  our  future 
policy.1 

To  repea.  the  prohibition  against  the  purchase  of  for- 
eign ships  is  not  therefore  a  free-trade  measure,  in  the 
sense  in  which  that  term  is  generally  used,  but  a  measure 
in  the  largest  interest  of  protection.  It  is  a  measure,  not 
so  much  with  a  view  of  setting  our  commerce  up,  as  for 
removing  an  obstacle  to  its  setting  itself  up.  It  is  a  gen- 
uine American  policy  according  to  the  doctrine  of  protec- 
tion, inasmuch  as  it  will  tend  to  promote  and  develop  a 

1  The  American  consul  at  Naples,  in  a  recent  report  to  the  State  Depart- 
ment, furnishes  the  following  practical  illustration  of  the  truth  of  this  propo- 
sition. Alluding  to  the  recent  notable  increase  of  foreign  vessels  engaged 
in  the  trade  between  American  and  Mediterranean  ports,  he  says,  "  All  these 
foreign  vessels  engaged  in  the  carrying  trade  between  the  Mediterranean  and 
the  United  States  show  that  there  is  no  want  of  business.  But  the  trouble  is, 
our  vessels  are  not  able  to  compete  with  them  for  it,  for  the  very  simple 
reason  that  it  costs  an  American  ship-owner  more  to  build  or  buy  and  run  a 

vessel  than  it  does  a  foreigner.     For  this  reason  it  was  that  Mr. of  New 

York  had  to  run  his  fruit-steamers  last  year  under  the  English  flag  instead  of 
under  the  American.  The  effort  to  protect  our  few  ship-builders  by  not  permit- 
ting our  merchants  to  buy  ships  abroad  has  simply  had  the  effect  of  prevent- 
ing a  return  of  our  commercial  prosperity  without  benefiting  our  ship-builders ; 
for  our  few  vessels,  built  by  them  at  a  greater  cost,  cannot  compete  in  the 
carrying  trade  with  vessels  that  cost  less.  While  foreign  steamers  and  sail- 
ing-vessels are  continually  finding  cargoes  in  Naples  and  other  Italian  ports 
for  New  York,  our  vessels  are  very  frequently  returning  in  ballast,  after  dis- 
charging their  cargoes  of  petroleum  or  tobacco,  because  they  cannot  afford  to 
accept  the  rates  offered  for  carrying  fruits,  marble,  sulphur,  rags,  etc." 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  131 

great  branch  of  domestic  industry,  while  the  present 
policy,  which  pretends  to  be  genuine,  is  really  promotive 
of  European  interests ;  and  finally,  but  not  least,  it  is  a 
protection  that  is  to  accrue  by  the  taking-off,  and  not  by 
the  imposing,  of  restrictions  and  taxes. 

But  some  may  ask,  Is  there  not  an  enormous  injustice 
involved  in  subjecting  to  a  high  rate  of  duty  every  thing 
imported  that  enters  into  the  composition  of  steamers 
and  ships,  —  such  as  iron,  brass,  boiler-plates,  rivets,  cop- 
per, crockery,  bedding,  wire,  cordage,  anchors,  etc.,  —  and 
then  allowing  the  vessels  themselves,  all  equipped  and 
composed  of  these  same  articles,  to  be  imported  free  of  all 
duty  ?  The  answer  to  this  is  to  be  found  in  the  circum- 
stance that  the  commodities  above  specified,  when  im- 
ported separately,  are  for  use  in  a  protected  market,  while 
the  ship  as  a  whole  is  to  be  used  in  an  open  and  unpro- 
tected market  in  competition  with  ships  that  are  not  bur- 
dened with  taxes  on  their  constituent  materials.  In  the 
home  and  protected  market,  if  the  manufacturer  of  cloth 
or  of  hardware  is  obliged,  for  the  sake  of  protecting  or 
favoring  the  domestic  iron  and  steel  industries,  to  pay  more 
for  his  metals  or  his  machinery,  he  can  recoup  himself 
by  adding  the  tax  or  advance  to  the  prices  of  his  finished 
product,  when  the  burden  is  transferred  to  the  domestic 
consumers,  who,  as  they  cannot  avail  themselves  of  any 
other  market  or  more  favorable  conditions,  have  to  bear  it. 
But  when  an  American  citizen,  employing  vessels  bur- 
dened with  an  undue  cost,  undertakes  to  compete  on  the 


132  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

open  ocean  with  foreign  vessels  constructed  at  some  30 
to  40  per  cent  less  cost,  he  cannot  in  any  way  recoup 
himself  on  his  customers  for  his  disadvantage,  for  the  rate 
at  which  the  cheaper  class  of  vessels  can  afford  to  perform 
the  service  required  will  determine  the  rate  for  all.  "The 
vessel  launched  upon  the  Delaware  and  the  vessel  launched 
upon  the  Clyde  compete  upon  precisely  the  same  condi- 
tions upon  the  broad  arena  of  international  commerce." 
In  short,  the  American  sailor  and  ship-owner  engaged  in 
foreign  trade  are  so  situated  that  they  experience  all  the 
burdens  of  the  tariff  and  nothing  of  its  protection.  There 
is  protection  for  an  infinitude  of  other  manufacturing  and 
business  interests  of  much  less  importance  to  the  country, 
ranging  all  the  way  from  lo  to  150  per  cent;  but  for  the 
manufacture  of  ships,  and  particularly  steamships,  to  be 
employed  in  the  foreign  carrying  trade,  there  is  not  only 
no  protection,  but  a  heavy  and  discriminating  imposition 
of  burdens.  How  heavily  the  existing  tariff  (1882)  lays  its 
hand  upon  the  American  ship-building  and  ship-using 
interest  at  every  point,  is  clearly  shown  by  the  following 
table  :  — 

TAXES  ON  SOME  OF  THE  PRINCIPAL  MATERIALS  USED  IN  STEAM- 
SHIP MANUFACTURE  UNDER  THE  EXISTING  TARIFF. 

Wrought  iron  for   ships   and    steam-engines,  2 

cents  per  pound 18  p.  ct.  ad  valorem. 

Cables  and  cable  chains,  2£  cents  per  pound        .  56    "  " 

Anchors   and   parts   of   anchors,   2^  cents    per 

pound 56    "  " 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  133 

Boiler  and  other  plate  iron,  25  dollars  per  ton      .  69  p.  ct.  ad  valorem. 

Nails  and  spikes,  i£  cents  per  pound   .        .        .  37  "  " 

Cast-iron  steam-pipes,  i  £  cents  per  pound    .        .  47  "  " 

Rolled  or  hammered  iron,  i\  cents  per  pound      .  54  "  " 

Screws,  for  wood,  8  to  1 1  cents  per  pound   .        .  50  "  " 

Sheet-iron,  i£  to  3  cents  per  pound       ...        .  51  "  " 

Copper  sheathing,  3  cents  per  pound    .        .        .  26  "  " 
Wire  rope,  strand,  or  chain,  2  cents  per  pound 

and  1 5  per  cent 57  "  " 

Wrought  rivets  and  bolts,  2^  cents  per  pound      .  44  "  " 
Wrought  steam  and  water  tubes,  3^  cents  per 

pound 67  "  " 

Steel  in  forms  not  otherwise  specified  .        .        .  30  "  " 

Tarred  cable  and  cordage,  3  cents  per  pound       .  26  "  " 

Manilla  (untarred)  cable,  2£  cents  per  pound        .  26  "  " 

Other  descriptions,  untarred,  3^  cents  per  pound  .  24  "  " 

Sail  duck,  or  canvas  for  sails        .        .        .        .  30  "  " 

Tar  and  pitch 20  "  " 

Plank,  deals,  and  other  sawed  lumber  of  hemlock, 

i  dollar  per  1,000  feet. 

Timber  for  spars   .        .        .        ...        .  20  "  " 

And,  as  typical  of  this  whole  system,  it  may  be  fur- 
ther noted,  that  the  American  flag,  —  which  symbolizes  our 
sovereignty  and  our  commerce,  —  through  the  taxes  im- 
posed on  the  bunting  of  which  it  is  composed,  is  com- 
paratively one  of  the  most  costly  luxuries  that  a  citizen  of 
the  United  States  can  indulge  in;  the  tariff  on  the  im- 
portation of  bunting,  levied  for  the  benefit  of  mainly  one 
corporation  in  New  England,  ranging  from  77  to  132  per 
cent  ad  valorem. 


134  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

And  if  to  these  and  other  taxes  are  taken  into  account 
the  State  and  municipal  taxes  on  the  finished  ships  and 
their  constituents,  our  excessive  tonnage,  clearance  and 
harbor  dues,  compulsory  pilotage,  and  the  like,  one  soon 
ceases  to  wonder  why  American  shipping  —  apart  from 
the  coasting  trade  —  is  practically  a  thing  of  the  past,  and 
why  even  the  coasting  trade,  protected  as  it  is  from  all 
foreign  competition,  does  not  flourish  and  hold  its  own. 

But,  interesting  as  this  discussion  may  be  from  a  theo- 
retical point  of  view,  it  is  at  present  of  little  practical  im- 
portance ;  for  as. the  United  States  are  building  no  ships 
for  employment  in  foreign  trade,  never  have  built  any  in 
recent  years  except  as  experiments,  and  are  never  likely 
to  under  existing  laws  which  offer  a  premium  "  not  to  do 
it,"  there  is  no  substantial  existing  ship-building  interest 
to  protect.  What  is  called  the  great  American  industry 
of  ship-building  is  at  present  but  the  interest  of  a  very 
few  individuals,  —  mainly  iron-ship  builders,  —  whose  so- 
licitude about  the  condition  of  our  commercial  marine 
does  not  extend  beyond  the  limits  of  their  own  ship-yards, 
and  whose  impudence  and  persistency  in  demanding  that 
they  shall  have  employment,  though  our  ocean  tonnage  in 
the  mean  time  becomes  extinct,  borders  closely  on  the 
sublime. 

No  Rational  Defence  of  our  Navigation  Laws  possible. 

Finally,  those  who  oppose  the  repeal  of  the  present 
navigation  laws  on  the  ground  that  it  is  necessary  to 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  135 

maintain  them  in  order  to  protect  American  ship-build- 
ing, encourage  commerce,  promote  national  independence, 
and  educate  a  large  body  of  skilful  seamen  ready  for  any 
emergency,  find  themselves  confronted  with  the  disagree- 
able and  undisputed  facts,  that,  under  the  influence  of 
these  very  laws,  our  ship-yards  have  become  deserted,  our 
ocean  carrying  trade  has  dwindled  to  insignificance,  while 
an  American  sailor  has  come  to  be  regarded  almost  in  the 
light  of  a  curiosity.  In  short,  every  end  for  which  the 
navigation  laws  were  originally  instituted  has  been  frus- 
trated ;  and  no  result  following  their  repeal  could  be  any 
worse  than  what  exists,  or  is  certain  to  follow  their  con- 
tinuance. 

Another  result  of  the  present  state  of  things,  which,  if 
it  has  not  already  happened  in  a  degree,  is  certainly  to  be 
apprehended  in  the  future,  is  the  destruction,  through  the 
shutting-out  of  free  competition  with  foreign  ship-builders, 
of  the  inventive  faculty  of  our  nautical  engineers  and  me- 
chanics. American  genius  in  days  past  has  led  the  way 
in  many  great  improvements  in  marine  architecture ;  but 
with  the  decline  of  our  ocean  marine,  the  shutting-up  of 
our  yards,  and  the  continuance  of  antiquated,  obstructive 
laws,  we  seem  to  offer  no  longer  any  incentive  to  either 
genius  or  enterprise  in  this  direction.  Bring  back  the 
ships,  even  by  buying  them  abroad,  and  the  repairs  of  a 
large  merchant  marine  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  which 
cannot  be  avoided,  will  afford  more  employment  to  labor, 
and  require  the  use  of  more  capital,  than  ship-building  in 


136  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  United  States  now  does  or  ever  can  under  the  exist- 
ing system.  We  must  be  a  large  ship-using,  before  we 
can  be  a  large  ship-building,  nation.  And,  in  respect  to 
the  plea  so  frequently  urged  about  the  claims  of  home 
labor  in  ship-building,  it  should  be  remembered  that  more 
wages  are  probably  disbursed  to  sailors  in  a  single  week 
in  the  little  of  the  ocean  marine  that  is  still  left  to  us  than 
all  the  ship-builders  in  the  country  —  iron  and  wood  — 
now  pay  their  operatives  in  an  entire  year. 

Proposed  Revival  of  American    Shipping  by   means  of 

Subsidies. 

Second,  But  it  is  claimed  that  the  decadence  of  Ameri- 
can shipping  can  be  arrested,  and  an  era  of  maritime  pros- 
perity inaugurated,  in  some  other  and  better  manner  than 
by  the  repeal  of  the  navigation  laws ;  that  is,  by  the  pay- 
ment of  bounties  or  subsidies.  Or  in  other  words,  having 
almost  completely  destroyed  a  great  branch  of  domestic 
industry  by  compelling  it  to  submit  to  the  unnatural 
restraints  of  an  artificial  system,  it  is  now  proposed  to 
repair  the  damage,  not  by  removing  the  cause,  but  by 
resorting  to  another  artificial  expedient,  namely,  the 
hiring  of  men  to  do  what  the  first  artificial  system  (which 
it  is  proposed  to  continue)  makes  it  for  their  interest  not 
to  do.  On  its  very  face,  could  any  proposition  be  more 
economically  monstrous  and  unpractical  ?  But,  discarding 
all  matters  of  sentiment,  let  us  examine  the  proposition  in 
question  from  a  purely  practical  point  of  view. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  137 

The  first  objection  to  this  scheme  is,  that  it  is  a  mere 
palliative,  and  even  if  remedial  in  part,  and  unobjection- 
able as  a  matter  of  public  policy,  bears  no  proportion  to 
the  magnitude  of  the  trouble  to  be  dealt  with.  It  is  a 
good  deal  like  the  old  method  of  using  perfumes  to  cover 
up  the  results  of  organic  nastiness,  or  of  bathing  a  swollen 
limb  with  liniment  when  it  is  a  fractured  bone  that  needs 
setting.  Suppose  the  government  should  appropriate  sev- 
eral millions  of  dollars  to  compensate  several  American- 
built  lines  of  steamers  for  running  at  a  loss  in  competi- 
tion with  steamers  of  foreign  construction.  Undoubtedly 
this  policy  would  benefit  the  lines  so  subsidized.  Capital- 
ists can  unquestionably  be  bribed  to  float  the  American 
flag  to  a  certain  extent.  But  how  about  all  the  rest  of 
our  commercial  marine  that  is  threatened  with  annihila- 
tion ?  Does  anybody  suppose,  with  the  present  temper  of 
a  large  proportion  of  the  American  people  in  respect 
to  subsidies,  protection,  and  the  expenditure  of  public 
moneys  raised  by  taxation,  that  the  policy  of  paying 
bounties  can  be  continued  indefinitely  as  to  both  time  and 
amount  ?  But  they  must  be  so  continued  on  the  bounty 
theory,  unless  the  causes  which  will  not  allow  citizens  of 
the  United  States  to  build  and  use  ships  as  cheaply  as 
foreigners,  are  removed ;  and  if  they  are  removed  their 
bounties  will  no  longer  be  necessary,  for  ships  then  will 
be  procured  without  bounties.  The  application  of  boun- 
ties is  therefore  a  mere  temporizing  policy,  and  does  not 
meet  the  broad  problem,  how  to  prevent  the  transfer  of 


138  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE, 

our  whole  ocean  service  to  foreigners.  What  the  country 
needs  is  a  system  that  will  enable  it  to  run  steamships 
everywhere  on  the  ocean,  in  successful  competition  with 
those  .of  other  countries.  It  wants  such  a  system  at  once, 
before  the  existing  ruts  of  commerce  which  now  turn 
away  from  the  United  States  have  become  any  further 
deepened,  and  mercantile  habits  and  alliances  adverse  to 
our  interests,  which  have  all  the  force  of  the  law,  are 
further  established.  In  these  days,  when  space  and  time 
are  no  obstacles  to  the  intercourse  of  nations,  when  inter- 
national barriers,  formerly  so  obstructive  to  trade,  are 
being  rapidly  removed,  days  and  weeks  count  as  much  in 
the  world's  business  as  months  and  years  once  did ;  and 
the  United  States  cannot  afford  to  wait  for  the  slow  con- 
struction of  the  few  ocean  lines  of  steamers  that  it  is 
proposed  to  put  in  operation  under  the  subsidy  system. 
"  Why  don't  you  file  a  crowbar  down  to  a  needle  ? "  asked 
a  Chinese  woman  of  a  New-England  missionary.  "  Be- 
cause it  takes  too  long,  and  is  not  the  fashion  in  this  age 
of  steam,"  was  the  reply. 

Again :  our  whole  experience  in  respect  to  the  pay- 
ment of  bounties  or  subsidies  as  a  method  of  encouraging 
ocean  navigation  has  been  unfavorable.  The  Federal  ex- 
chequer for  years  was  opened  in  order  that  that  mode  of 
developing  our  steam-marine  might  have  a  fair  trial ;  and 
to-day  what  do  we  see  ?  Hardly  a  solitary  United-States 
steamship  in  the  transatlantic  carrying  trade ;  and  New 
York,  Boston,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  and  New  Orleans, 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  139 

to  all  intents  and  purposes,  not  American,  but  British, 
German,  French,  Italian,  and  Scandinavian  ports. 

Before  the  war,  the  government  contributed  largely  in 
way  of  subsidies  to  the  Collins,  Havre,  Bremen,  Pacific, 
and  other  lines,  but  these  contributions  had  no  effect  in 
preventing  the  continued  decay  of  our  commercial  ma- 
rine; and  in  1 860-61  there  were  no  ocean  mail-steamers, 
away  from  our  coasts,  under  the  American  flag,  with  the 
single  possible  exception  of  a  line  of  two  vessels  between 
New  York  and  Havre. 

From  1867  to  1877,  when  there  was  no  war  or  Confed- 
erate cruisers  to  interfere  with  the  development  of  our 
commerce  and  the  use  of  American  ships,  the  United 
States  paid  still  larger  sums  in  the  way  of  subsidies ;  in 
the  aggregate,  $4,750,000  to  the  Pacific  Mail  Steamship 
Company,  and  $1,812,000  to  the  line  between  the  United 
States  and  Brazil.  The  system  as  an  agency  for  restoring 
our  commercial  marine  had,  therefore,  during  this  period 
of  eleven  years,  as  fair  a  trial  as  possible ;  and  the  re- 
sults it  worked  out  so  far  failed  to  accomplish  what  its 
advocates  had  in  view,  and  were  connected  with  such  a 
disgraceful  chapter  of  Federal  legislation,  that  from  that 
day  to  this,  Congress  and  the  country,  as  if  disgusted  with 
the  record,  have  indignantly  set  their  faces  against  the 
whole  system,  and  few,  save  those  who  have  had  special 
interests  to  promote,  have  come  forward  to  urge  its  re- 
vival. 

Doubtless  the  payment  of  bounties  to  American  ship- 


I4O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

ping  would  be  productive  of  one  desirable  result,  besides 
benefiting  the  owners  of  the  vessels  who  are  to  be  the 
recipients ;  namely,  it  would  prevent  our  flag  from  being 
absolutely  driven  from  the  ocean.  But  how  much  will 
the  country  be  likely  to  be  called  upon  to  pay  for  such  a 
result  ?  "  The  New- York  Commercial  Bulletin  "  has  re- 
cently made  an  approximative  estimate.  Judging  from 
the  provision,  in  the  subsidy  bills  recently  presented  to 
Congress,  about  $35  per  ton  will  ordinarily  be  required  to 
enable  the  American-built  steamer  to  compete  with  the 
foreign.  "At  this  rate,"  says  "The  Bulletin,"  "each 
vessel  of  3,000  tons  would  require  a  subsidy  income  of 
about  $105,000  a  year;  ten  such  vessels  would  need 
$1,050,000;  and  an  addition  of  100,000  tons  to  our  ocean 
tonnage  would  call  for  a  subsidy  of  $3,500,000.  Now,  as- 
suming the  people  to  be  willing  to  absolutely  throw  away 
$3,500,000  for  the  mere  glory  of  the  thing,  how  much 
glory  would  they  get  for  that  expenditure?  Our  100,000 
tons  would  be  equal  to  less  than  4  per  cent  of  the  pres- 
ent ocean  steam-tonnage  of  Great  Britain,  our  great  com- 
petitor ! " 

Let  us  consider,  furthermore,  from  a  business  and  not  a 
sentimental  standpoint,  what  is  to  be  gained  by  subsidies 
to  shipping  ?  It  will  not  be  contended  that  ocean  freights 
are  in  consequence  to  be  made  cheaper.  That  is  not  the 
point  ;  but  it  is  claimed  that  Americans  will  thereby  be 
able  to  participate  to  a  greater  extent  than  they  now  do  in 
the  business  of  ocean  transportation.  They  cannot  now  do 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  14! 

so  at  a  profit  with  the  expensive  ships  that  they  must  use, 
or  go  without :  consequently,  any  profit  they  are  to  make 
under  the  subsidized  system  must  be  derived  from  the 
subsidies,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  taxes,  for  subsidies 
mean  increased  taxes.  The  subsidy  scheme  really  comes 
down,  then,  to  a  proposition  that  the  people  of  the  country 
should  be  further  taxed,  without  the  prospect  of  any  corre- 
sponding benefit.  What  answer  is  the  agricultural  por- 
tion of  our  people,  who  furnish  more  than  eight-tenths  of 
all  the  exports  of  the  country,  likely  to  return  to  such  a 
proposition  ?  Is  it  at  all  probable  that  they  will  consent 
to  be  taxed  in  order  to  have  their  cotton,  provisions,  and 
cereals  carried  at  one  and  the  same  rate  in  a  home-built 
vessel  in  preference  to  a  foreign  one?  If  the  policy  of 
granting  subsidies  would  lead  to  the  establishment  of  lines 
to  parts  of  the  world  with  which  the  United  States  has 
now  no  regular  and  direct  communication,  something 
might  be  said  in  its  favor.  But  such  routes  are  the  very 
last  which  the  subsidized  vessels  will  select ;  for  the 
commercial  policy  of  the  United  States,  other  than  that  in- 
volved in  the  navigation  laws,  stands  in  the  way  of  Ameri- 
can vessels  obtaining  freights  upon  many  desirable  ocean 
routes,  both  in  going  and  returning,  and  under  such  cir- 
cumstances lines  subsidized  at  the  rate  of  even  $3 5  per 
ton  could  not  long  maintain  themselves.  It  seems  clear, 
therefore,  that  subsidies  as  a  means  of  restoring  Ameri- 
can shipping  cannot  be  made  the  policy  of  "the  United 
States,  and  that,  as  it  is  idle  to  look  for  remedies  in  this 


142  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

direction,  valuable  time  and  great  opportunities  should  be 
no  longer  wasted  in  discussing  it. 

Has  the  Commercial  Marine  of  Great  Britain  and  other 
Maritime  Countries  been  built  up  and  sustained  by  the 
Agency  of  Subsidies,  or  Extraordinary  Payments  of 
Money  on  the  Part  of  the  State  ? 

Prominent  among  the  arguments  brought  forward  in 
support  of  the  proposition  to  attempt  to  arrest  the  decay 
and  restore  the  prosperity  of  our  commercial  marine  by 
means  of  subsidies,  or  extraordinary  payment  on  the  part 
of  the  Government,  is  the  assertion,  that  the  systematic 
appropriation  of  large  sums  for  the  special  object  of  encour- 
aging ship-using  and  ship-building  has  always  been  the 
practice  and  policy  of  Great  Britain  ;  and,  further,  that 
through  the  continuance  and  present  maintenance  of  such 
a  system  is  to  be  attributed  in  great  part  the  continued 
advance  and  present  great  development  of  the  British 
shipping  interest.  So  frequently  and  so  unqualifiedly, 
moreover,  have  these  assertions  been  made  during  re- 
cent years  on  the  floor  of  Congress,  by  public  officials, 
by  Chambers  of  Commerce,  and  by  leading  journals,1  and 

1  "  England,  feeling  her  advantage  and  eager  to  push  it,  did  not  leave  her 
commerce  to  its  own  development,  even  with  all  the  elements  in  her  favor; 
but  she  stimulated  its  growth  by  enormous  bounties  paid  to  those  who  would 
build  and  sail  steamships."  "  A  current  misrepresentation  is  to  the  effect 
that  European  countries,  having  realized  the  impolicy  of  aiding  steamship 
lines  of  money  subsidies,  have  abandoned  it.  Just  the  reverse  is  the  truth." 
—  Letter  of  Hon.  James  G.  Elaine  to  the  Merchants  of  New  York,  June,  1879. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  143 

60  seldom  have  they  been  questioned,  that  the  people 
of  the  United  States  have  very  generally  come  to  regard 
them  as  matters  of  history  and  of  record,  which  could  not 
be  doubted;  and,  the  premises  being  once  accepted,  the 
conclusion  was  legitimate,  that  for  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment to  adopt  the  subsidy  system  was  but  to  follow  a 
policy  which  the  long  experience  of  the  greatest  maritime 
nation  of  the  world  had  taken  out  of  the  domain  of  theory, 
and  proved  to  be  eminently  wise,  practicable,  and  suc- 
cessful. All  these  assertions,  however,  will  be  found  on 
examination  to  rest  upon  no  truthful  or  substantial  basis ; 
and  are  what  may  be  properly  designated  as  "  historic 
lies,"  originating  mainly,  in  the  first  instance,  without 
intent  to  deceive,  through  an  .imperfect  understanding  of 
the  subject,  and  subsequently  repeated  and  given  credence 
on  the  basis  of  some  personal  and  supposed  trustworthy 
authority,  without  any  attempt  to  inquire  further  as  to 
their  accuracy. 

In  support  of  this  averment,  attention  is  asked  to  the 
following  statement  of  facts  :  — 

In  the  annually  published  fiscal  exhibit  of  the  British 
Government,  an  item  of  expenditure  always  appears  in 

"  In  addition,  it  is  found  that  Great  Britain,  with  a  keen  perception  of  the 
incalculable  advantage  and  benefit  it  is  to  her  people  to  attain  the  supremacy 
of  the  ocean,  has  led  up  to  it  by  a  system  of  subsidies;  and  it  is  well  known 
and  authenticated  that  for  many  years  that  country  has  not  only  aided  in  its 
development,  but  maintained  the  existence  of  its  commercial  lines  by  a 
system  of  subsidies."  —  Report  Special  Committee  New~York  Chamber  of 
Commerce,  "  On  American  Shipping"  January,  1882. 


144  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

the  accounts  of  the  Post-Office  Department,  under  the 
head  of  "Packet  Service ;"  and  which,  in  the  absence  of 
any  similar  expenditure  on  the  part  of  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment, seems  large  to  a  citizen  of  the  United  States ;  the 
gross  aggregate  ranging  from  ^1,138,700  ($5,693,500)  in 
1872,  to  ,£884,054  ($4,420,270)  in  1876,  and  .£710,514 
($3.552,570)  in  1882. 

In  the  recent  discussions  which  have  taken  place  on 
this  subject  in  the  United  States,  the  inference  and  asser- 
tion are  both  often  made,  that  this  item  of  expenditure 
represents  the  amount  of  subsidy  or  bounty  which  Great 
Britain  annually  pays  to  her  steamship  lines  for  their  sup- 
port or  encouragement,  irrespective  of  the  cost  of  her 
postal  service.1  Such,  however,  is  not  the  case.  Great 
Britain  does  not  subsidize 2  (using  the  term  in  the  sense 
of  bounties  or  premiums)  any  of  her  steamship  lines. 

1  "  This  very  year,  besides   a  liberal   allowance  for  sea-postages,  Great 
Britain  is  paying  her  various  steamship  lines  a  subsidy  exceeding  $3,700,000, 
or,   to  quote   accurately  from  the  appropriation  of   Parliament,  .£767,877." 
—  Letter  by  Hon.  James  G.  Elaine  to  the  Merchants  of  New  York,  June  17, 
1879. 

2  To  one  who  proposes  to  investigate  this  subject  himself,  some  confusion 
may  result  from  the  different  sense  in  which  the  term  "  subsidy  "  is  used  in 
the   United    States  and   England.     In   the  former,   the   term   is  generally 
regarded  as  equivalent  to  a  "  bounty,"  or  "  premium,"  to  encourage,  or  as 
compensation  disproportionate  to  the  ordinary  commercial  value  of  the  ser- 
vice  rendered.     In   England,  on   the   contrary,  as  in  Lindsay's  "  Merchant 
Shipping,"  the  term  is  not  exclusively  used  in  the  sense  of  a  bounty,  but  is 
applied  indifferently  to  any  payment  by  the  government  for  its  ocean  mail- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  145 

The  amount  charged  under  the  head  of  "  packet  service," 
in  her  fiscal  exhibits,  simply  represents  compensation  for 
carriage  of  ocean  mails  for  the  United  Kingdom,  the  colo- 
nies, and  foreign  governments,  and  is  not  additional  to 
such  payments  ;  and  any  inference  that  such  expenditures 
partake  in  any  degree  of  the  nature  of  bounties  is  as  un- 
warranted as  would  be  the  supposition  that  the  amounts 
likewise  annually  expended  by  Great  Britain  for  ordnance, 
armor-plates,  or  cavalry-horses,  are,  in  all  or  part,  for  the 
purpose  of  encouraging  her  miners,  iron-workers,  or  stock- 
raisers.  Furthermore,  the  expenditures  annually  charged 
to  the  account  of  packet  service,  in  the  returns  of  the 
British  Post-Office  Department,  represent  only  the  gross 
amounts  paid,  without  regard  to  certain  repayments  re- 
ceived from  the  colonial  governments,  and  from  other 
countries  where  letters  are  in  part  carried  by  the  English 
mails.  These  repayments  usually  amount  to  about  two- 
thirds  of  the  gross  sum  charged  under  the  head  of  British 
Postal  Expenditures,  and  are  credited  under  the  head  of 
Post-Office  and  Miscellaneous  Receipts.  Thus,  for  exam- 
ple, in  1872  Great  Britain  paid  in  gross  .£984,625  to 
various  steamship  companies  for  her  whole  foreign  mail, 
or  "packet"  service;  but  of  this  sum  £210,839  was  re- 
imbursed by  the  colonies,  and  .£442,095  by  other  coun- 
tries ;  leaving  £332,700  as  the  net  payment  by  the 
government  for  that  year  on  account  of  purely  British 
postage.  And  in  later  years  the  amount  of  this  item  has 
been  very  considerably  reduced.  It  will  thus  appear,  that, 


146  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE, 

instead  of  Great  Britain  having  paid  nearly  $5,000,000  in 
1872  as  subsidies  to  her  ocean  steamship  lines,  her  net 
expenditures  were  only  about  one-third  that  amount ;  and 
that  was  not  in  any  sense  as  subsidy,  but  under  contracts 
made  by  the  Post-Office  Department,  solely  upon  con- 
siderations affecting  the  efficiency  and  economy  of  the 
mail-service.  The  fact,  also,  that  all  such  contracts  are 
always  made  after  public  advertisement  and  public  com- 
petitive tenders  on  the  part  of  all  who  may  desire  to  parti- 
cipate in  the  service,  excludes  the  possibility  of  there 
being  any  thing  in  them  in  the  nature  of  a  benefaction  or 
bounty,  which  could  alone  be  authorized  by  a  direct  and 
specific  enactment  by  Parliament. 

A  word  next  in  explanation  of  this  so-called  "  packet 
service  "  of  Great  Britain,  which  finds  no  exact  counter- 
part in  the  administrative  machinery  of  the  Federal 
Government.  For  two  hundred  years,  and  more,  Great 
Britain  has  maintained  a  system  of  colonies,  and  military 
ports,  all  over  the  surface  of  the  globe;  and  it  has  been 
both  a  political  and  military  necessity  to  that  government, 
that  communication  between  her  vast  foreign  dependencies 
(now  embracing  some  200,000,000  of  population)  and  the 
mother-country,  by  means  of  ocean  ship-service,  should  be 
constantly  and  efficiently  kept  up.  The  expense  of  such 
a  policy  has  obviously  at  all  times  been  very  considerable  ; 
and  as  some  of  the  British  colonies  and  military  stations 
are  without  the  direct  lines  of  the  world's  commerce,  it 
has  been  found  necessary  in  some  special  cases  to  pay 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  147 

comparatively  large  sums  for  the  sake  of  securing  regular 
communication  with  them.  But  no  one  ever  thought  of 
regarding  such  payments  in  the  days  of  sailing-vessels  as 
in  the  nature  of  subsidies  for  the  encouragement  of  com- 
merce and  ship-building. 

At  the  outset  this  entire  service  was  necessarily  per- 
formed by  sailing-vessels,  partially  under  government  and 
partially  under  private  ownership ;  and  as  political  consid- 
erations at  that  time  entered  into  this  matter  of  ocean 
mail  transportation,  the  supervision  of  the  whole'  business 
was  intrusted  to  the  Admiralty ;  while  the  expenditures 
incurred  were  aggregated  and  voted  by  Parliament  under 
the  general  head  of  "Naval  Estimates."  In  1821  the 
British  Government  undertook  to  do  this  work  mainly 
with  its  own  vessels,  and  accordingly  established  regular 
lines  under  the  title  of  the  "  British  (Ocean)  Packet  Ser- 
vice ; "  but  the  experiment  proved  so  costly,  that  after 
twelve  years'  experience,  or  in  1833,  it  was  abandoned, 
and  the  system  of  private  contract  was  mainly  substituted. 
When  ocean  steam-navigation  became  a  possibility,  the 
same  policy  was  continued. 

It  is  not  to  be  denied  that  at  the  outset  Great  Britain 
paid  much  more  for  her  ocean  steamship  service  that  she 
has  in  later  years,  and  for  the  same  reason  that  she  would 
have  had  to  pay  $140  per  ton  for  Bessemer  steel  in  1867, 
which  she  can  now  buy  for  $30  ;  namely,  it  cost  more. 
Up  to  about  1851-52  the  problem  whether  any  ocean 
steamship  could  be  navigated  with  profit  was  a  doubtful 


148  OUR   MERCHANT  MARINE. 

one ;  and  it  may  be  admitted,  that,  foreseeing  how  the 
union  of  all  the  parts  of  her  widely  extended  empire 
would  be  enormously  strengthened  by  its  successful  solu- 
tion, Great  Britain  for  a  term  of  years  paid  more  than 
the  actual  mail-service  rendered  her  by  the  steamers  was 
worth,  in  order  to  promote  it.  But,  if  such  were  her 
motives,  the  result  sattained  were  not  exclusive,  but  were 
open  to  all  the  world  to  profit  by ;  and  the  Americans, 
coming  in  later  into  the  business,  did  so  far  profit  by 
them,  that  in  1851  the  foreign  steamship  tonnage  of  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States  was  almost  equal,  that  of 
the  former  being  65,900  tons,  and  that  of  the  latter 
62,300. 

In  1851,  the  problem  of  the  success  of  ocean  steamship 
navigation  having  been  favorably  decided,  Mr.  John  Inman, 
possessing  no  more  information  or  facilities  than  were 
available  to  other  competitors,  started  his  line  of  trans- 
atlantic screw  steamers,  which  were  to  carry  general 
cargo  and  emigrant  passengers,  and  to  be  independent  in 
all  respects  of  either  the  British  Admiralty  or  the  Post 
Office ;  and  from  that  time  to  this  there  has  been  a 
constant  succession  of  other  lines  put  in  operation  which 
have  been  pre-eminently  successful,  and  which  have  never 
received  government  aid  of  any  kind,  not  even  compensa- 
tion for  ocean  postal  service.  And  these  facts,  which  can- 
not be  questioned  or  denied,  conclusively  demonstrate  the 
unsoundness  of  the  assertion,  on  the  one  hand,  that  the 
present  great  development  and  supremacy  of  British  ocean 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  149 

'steam-navigation  is  due  to  the  continued  payment  of 
bounties  by  the  government ;  and,  on  the  other,  that 
government  aid  in  the  way  of  subsidies  (bounties)  is  and 
has  been  necessary  for  the  resuscitation  of  the  American 
commercial  marine,  unless  it  is  at  the  same  time  assumed 
that  the  Americans  are  an  inferior  race,  and  are  unable 
to  do  under  equal  circumstances  what  the  Englishman  has 
found  no  difficulty  in  accomplishing.  And,  if  circum- 
stances have  not  been  equal,  it  is  because  our  navigation 
laws  and  fiscal  policy  would  not  permit  it,  and  for  no 
other  reasons.  But  let  us  now  go  back,  and  follow  up  more 
particularly  the  policy  of  the  British  Government  in  re- 
spect to  her  ocean  mail  and  transport  service  from  the 
year  1833,  when  the  exclusive  government  packet  service 
was  abandoned,  and  the  system  of  private  contracts 
adopted.  The  business,  as  before  stated,  was  continued 
under  the  charge  of  the  Admiralty,  and  was  neither 
wisely  nor  economically  conducted.  The  contracts,  it 
was  alleged,  were  not  awarded  impartially  ;  and  the  cost  of 
the  service  was  greatly  in  excess  of  the  postages  received. 
The  extent  of  the  expenditures,  from  the  fact  that  they 
were  included  under  the  head  of  naval  appropriations, 
did  not  for  a  long  time  attract  public  attention  ;  but  in 
1859-60  Parliament  took  up  the  matter,  and  commenced 
an  investigation.  An  attempt  was  made  to  exculpate  the 
Admiralty  on  the  grounds  that  its  large  outlays  had  been 
the  indirect  means  of  encouraging  commerce  and  creating 
a  steam-marine  available  in  case  of  war.  But  the  plea 


150  OUR  MERCHANT- MARINE. 

was  not  satisfactory  to  Parliament ;  and  in  1860  it  rebuked 
the  management  of  the  Admiralty  by  transferring  the 
whole  ocean  mail-service  to  the  Post  Office,  abolishing  the 
system  of  private  contracts,  and  throwing  the  whole  busi- 
ness open  to  public  competition.  And  such,  from  that 
day  to  this,  has  been  the  British  system.  Under  it  no 
more  is  paid  than  a  fair  commercial  price  for  the  service 
rendered  to  the  government ;  and  the  fact  of  public  tender 
for  the  service,  as  before  stated,  necessarily  excludes  the 
idea  of  any  gratuity.1  The  British  Government  also 
never  hesitates  to  employ  foreign  lines  of  steamers  when 
equal  service  or  cheaper  terms  can  be  obtained  from 
them,  as  has  been  the  case  with  the  American  Pacific 
Mail  line.  Furthermore,  the  value  of  the  payments 
which  the  British  Government  does  make  to  ocean 
steamship  lines  for  its  mail-service  are  much  dimin- 
ished by  the  strict  requirements  which  it  makes  in 
respect  to  construction,  equipment,  and  general  manage- 
ment of  the  vessels  employed.  To  most,  if  not  all,  of  its 
contracts,  heavy  penalties  are  attached  for  the  non-per- 

1  "There  is  no  evidence  before  us,  that,  during  recent  years  at  least,  Great 
Britain  has  sought  to  promote  ship-building  by  the  direct  payment  of  boun- 
ties or  subsidies.  She  has  removed  all  duties  upon  articles  entering  into 
the  construction  of  ships  or  necessary  for  their  outfit,  or  to  be  used  and 
consumed  by  them  at  sea.  She  has  also  repealed  all  restrictions  upon  the 
purchase  of  vessels  abroad;  and  thus,  by  the  application  of  the  healthful 
stimulus  of  foreign  competition,  she  has  quickened  the  energies  and  capabili- 
ties of  her  ship-builders  to  the  very  utmost."  —  Report  National  Board  of 
Trade  (United  States)>  1880. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  151 

formance  of  stipulations ;  and  these  penalties  are  under- 
stood to  be  rigidly  exacted.  Thus  the  Peninsular  and 
Oriental  Company  is  subjected  to  a  penalty  of  $500  for 
every  twelve  hours  in  excess  of  the  contract  time  between 
Brindisi  and  Bombay  on  outward  voyages,  and  $i,ooofor 
every  twelve  in  such  excess  on  the  homeward  voyage. 
On  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  Line,  when  the  voyages  ex- 
ceed the  contract  time  by  three  days,  heavy  penalties  are 
incurred  for  one  or  more  of  these  days ;  and  for  every  com- 
plete hour  in  addition,  £6.  $s.  is  exacted.  In  the  service 
between  Dover  and  Calais,  a  deduction  of  £$.  is  made  if 
a  steamer  is  fifteen  minutes  late ;  and  for  the  service 
between  Holyhead  and  Kingstown,  which  includes  the  ex- 
pedition of  the  mails  to  and  from  the  United  States,  there 
is  a  penalty  of  £i.  145.  a  minute  if  the  trips  between 
London  and  Kingstown,  Ireland,  exceed  the  stipulated 
limit. 

But  perhaps  nothing  better  in  the  way  of  helping  to  an 
understanding  of  this  subject  can  be  offered,  than  to  ask 
the  attention  of  the  reader  to  a  record  of  practical  experi- 
ence under  the  British  system,  —  a  record  extending  over 
the  whole  period  of  years  covered  by  this  controversy,  and 
so  full  and  capable  of  verification  as  to  leave  no  opportu- 
nity for  doubt  or  disputation.  One  of  the  greatest  and 
most  important  of  the  British  steamship  lines  is  that 
known  as  the  "  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Company,"  which 
carries  the  mails,  government  despatches,  and  messengers 
weekly  between  England,  Gibraltar,  Malta,  and  Alexan- 


I$2  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

dria,  with  a  special  line  from  Brindisi  in  Italy  to  Suez 
and  back,  in  connection  with  a  rapid  overland  mail 
through  France  and  Italy.  From  Suez,  lines  of  steamers 
run  to  Bombay,  Galle,  Ceylon,  from  whence  other  lines 
diverge  to  Madras  and  Calcutta,  to  the  various  ports  of 
Australia,  to  Singapore,  China,  and  Japan  ;  a  most  varied 
service,  most  important  to  the  government  in  view  of  its 
political  and  trade  relations  with  India  and  China,  and 
involving  great  expenditure.  If  there  ever  was  an  in- 
stance, therefore,  in  which  it  would  seem  that  the  British 
Government  would  and  ought  to  have  supported  a  line 
by  subsidies, — using  the  term  in  the  sense  of  payments 
disproportionate  to  the  commercial  value  of  the  service 
rendered,  —  we  would  expect  to  here  find  it. 

But  what  are  the  facts  ?  The  line  had  its  inception 
about  the  year  1825,  in  a  small  shipping  venture  started 
by  two  young  men,  —  Messrs.  Wilcox  and  Anderson,  —  with 
a  few  sailing-vessels  and  with  but  little  capital  or  influ- 
ence. By  plodding  and  intelligent  industry  they  gradu- 
ally earned  success ;  and  when  the  ocean  steamship  was 
introduced  they  established,  in  1834,  a  line  of  steamers 
between  London  and  Spain.  Previous  to  1837  the  gov- 
ernment mails  between  London,  Cadiz,  and  Gibralter  were 
conveyed  by  government  sailing-vessels  and  a  steam- 
packet.  The  steamers  of  Messrs.  Wilcox  and  Anderson 
being  more  efficient,  the  proprietors  offered  their  services 
to  the  government  for  the  transportation  of  letters ;  but 
so  far  from  the  government  exhibiting  any  interest  in  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  153 

new  enterprise,  their  proposals  were  for  a  considerable 
time  coldly  and  almost  contemptuously  disregarded  ;  and 
it  was  not  until  1837,  and  after  loud  complaints  on  the 
part  of  the  public  at  the  inefficiency  of  the  official  ser- 
vice, that  government  thought  it  expedient  to  inquire  of 
the  managers  of  the  Peninsular  steamers  if  they  had  plans 
or  proposals  to  submit.  They  did  submit  proposals,  and 
they  were  favorably  considered ;  but  here  comes  in  a  bit 
of  history  which  throws  a  flood  of  light  on  the  past  policy 
of  the  British  Government,  which  is  held  up  as  an  example 
for  the  United  States  to  follow. 

Thus  the  proposals  of  the  Peninsular  Company  were,  as 
before  stated,  received  with  favor  by  the  government ;  but 
at  the  same  time  the  company  was  informed  that  no  pri- 
vate contracts  would  be  made,  but  that  the  service  must 
be  put  up  to  public  competition.  And  an  advertisement 
was  accordingly  issued,  inviting  tenders  from  all  owners  of 
steam-vessels  for  the  conveyance  of  the  mails  between 
England  and  Cadiz,  in  conformity  with  the  plans  submit- 
ted by  the  Peninsular  Company ;  so  that  the  managers  of 
this  "struggling  undertaking,"  says  Mr.  Lindsay,1  "had 
to  compete  against  others  for  the  performance  of  this 
service,  though  on  plans  drawn  up  by  themselves  at  the 
request  of  the  government." 

Another  company  submitted  bids  more  favorable  than 
the  Peninsular  and  Oriental,  and  for  a  time  had  prefer- 

1  Lindsay  (W.  H.),  "  History  of  Merchant  Shipping,"  London,  1876. 


154  °UR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

ence  ;  but,  failing  to  comply  with  the  stipulations,  the  con- 
tract was  again  advertised,  and  again  thrown  open  to  the 
public,  when  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Company  took 
it,  but  only  on  condition  of  reducing  their  original  bid,  on 
demand  of  the  government,  from  ^29,600  to  ^"20,500. 
And  this  was  in  1837,  when  ocean  steam  navigation  was 
a  doubtful  experiment,  and  when,  according  to  the  advo- 
cates of  the  adoption  of  the  bounty  system  by  the  Federal 
Government,  Great  Britain  was  assiduously  building  up 
her  commercial  steam-marine  by  the  generous  appropria- 
tion of  enormous  subsidies.  So  far,  furthermore,  was  this 
from  being  the  case,  that  in  the  early  days  of  steam  navi- 
gation the  British  Government  rarely,  and  perhaps  never, 
took  the  initiative  in  respect  to  new  projects  for  ocean 
transport,  or  did  any  thing  whatever  for  their  encourage- 
ment, until  absolutely  driven  to  it  by  the  force  of  dissatis- 
fied public  opinion.1 

1  The  case  of  the  Cunard  Company  is  frequently  adduced  as  an  example 
to  the  contrary.  The  facts  are,  however,  as  follows :  The  idea  of  this  line 
originated  with  Mr.  Samuel  Cunard,  a  citizen  of  Halifax,  N.S.  It  received 
its  first  government  business,  as  the  most  favorable  bidder,  under  public 
advertisement,  by  the  Admiralty  in  1838,  for  proposals  for  the  conveyance  of 
the  North  American  mails  by  steamers.  The  original  contract  was  for  the 
performance  of  two  voyages  a  month,  and  three  steamers,  for  .£55,000  per 
annum.  Subsequently  the  Admiralty  required  four  vessels,  and  the  payment 
was  increased  to  ,£81,000  per  annum.  The  government  required  the  vessels 
to  be  built  after  their  own  specifications  and  under  their  inspection  ;  and  it 
was  also  provided  that  the  vessels  might  be  used  by  the  Admiralty  in  time  of 
war,  and  that  they  should  carry  officers  of  the  British  .navy.  Subsequently, 
when  the  Cunard  Line  had  been  established,  and  made  a  success,  great  com- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  155 

Such,  then,  was  the  origin  of  the  great  Peninsular  and 
Oriental  line  of  steamers.  The  proprietors  gradually  ex- 
tended their  business,  and  finally  stretched  out  to  India, 
and  superseded  the  old  lines  of  sailing-vessels  and  steam- 
packets  maintained  by  the  Government  and  the  East  India 
Company  for  mail  and  other  government  service.  But  it 
was  hard  work  all  the  time  for  the  company  to  obtain 
extended  opportunities  for  service  from  the  government. 
Thus,  in  1839,  tne  India  mails,  between  England  and 
Alexandria,  were  transported  in  the  main  by  government 
packets,  and  required  from  three  weeks  to  a  month  for  the 
performance  of  the  single  trip.  And,  "  imperfect  as  was 
this  mode  of  transportation,  it  would  probably  have  contin- 
ued many  years,  had  not  circumstances  occurred  rendering 
an  alteration  imperative;"  which  were  the  entering  into 
a  convention  by  the  British  Government  with  France  in 
1839  for  the  sending  of  letters  to  and  from  India  through 


plaints  were  made,  that  the  public  was  taxed  for  a  service  from  which  one 
company  alone  profited  ;  that  the  service  could  be  performed  at  far  less  ex- 
pense than  was  incurred ;  and  that  a  monopoly  had  been  created  by  the  Gov- 
ernment to  the  great  injury  of  other  steamship-lines  engaged  in  the  same 
trade,  or  who  were  desirous  of  entering  it ;  and  under  such  circumstances 
Parliament  ordered  an  official  investigation.  A  committee  of  the  House  of 
Commons  accordingly  investigated,  and  in  1846  reported  that  the  terms  of  the 
contract  with  the  Cunard  Company  were  more  advantageous  than  any  others 
that  could  then  be  made  by  the  Government,  and  that  the  service  had  been 
most  efficiently  performed.  And  here  ended  in  Great  Britain  all  further  talk 
about  government  monopolies  and  disproportionate  payments  in  respect  to 
this  line. 


156  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

France,  by  way  of  Marseilles,  and  from  thence  to  Malta 
and  Alexandria  by  admiralty  packets.  The  plan  worked 
badly;  and  this  fact,  together  with  the  circumstance  "that 
the  British  despatches  ran  some  risk  of  loss  in  their 
transit  through  France,"  compelled  the  government  to 
seek  some  quicker  and  different  means  of  conveyance  of 
the  mails.  The  managers  of  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental 
Company  again  came  forward,  and  submitted  proposals  for 
the  establishment  of  a  line  of  superior  steamers  between 
England  and  Alexandria,  at  a  cost  not  exceeding  what  was 
required  for  the  maintenance  of  the  small  and  inefficient 
admiralty  packets.  The  tender  was,  however,  received 
with  reluctance.  Many  people  of  influence,  says  Mr. 
Lindsay,  threw  their  influence  against  it,  and  almost  con- 
vinced the  gpvernment  of  the  desirability  of  again  trans- 
porting all  the  mails  by  the  old  way  of  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope ;  and  it  was  only  after  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental 
Company  had  bid  lower  for  the  service  than  all  others, 
and  had  proposed  in  addition  to  convey  all  officers  travel- 
ling on  public  service  at  reduced  rates,  and  admiralty 
packages  gratuitously,  that  their  offer  was  accepted.  But 
although  this  new  and  extended  service  worked  most 
profitably  and  satisfactorily  to  the  government  and  the 
public,  the  route  between  Suez  and  Bombay  remained 
under  the  control  of  the  East  India  Company,  notwith- 
standing the  vessels  employed  by  it  were  as  slow  and  as 
unsuitable  to  the  service  as  those  of  the  admiralty  had 
proved  to  be  between  England  and  Alexandria;  and  not- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  157 

withstanding,  further,  that  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental 
Company  offered  to  perform  the  service  in  question  for  \"js. 
per  mile  in  vessels  of  500  horse-power,  in  place  of  service 
costing  upwards  of  305-.  per  mile  in  vessels  of  not  half  the 
power  and  of  greatly  inferior  speed  and  accommodations. 
And  it  was  not  until  1854  that  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental 
Company  could  secure  an  additional  contract  for  this  ser- 
vice, and  would  not  even  then  in  all  probability  have  got 
it,  had  not  the  great  East  India  mail  been  lost  about  this 
time  in  the  Indian  Ocean  while  being  transported  in  a 
sailing-craft. 

Again  :  as  their  contracts  on  these  different  routes  ran 
out,  the  government  never  in  a  single  instance  renewed 
them  without  throwing  open  the  business  to  public  com- 
petition, and  continually  imposing  new  and  onerous 
conditions.  In  one  instance,  about  1852,  when  coal  rose 
temporarily  from  36^.  to  6os.  per  ton,  and  the  company, 
for  lack  of  supply,  found  it  difficult  to  carry  out  a  por- 
tion of  their  service,  the  government  threatened  to  inflict 
a  penalty  of  ,£35,000  for  its  non-performance,  and  would 
have  done  so  had  not  the  company  by  strenuous  efforts, 
and  at  great  expense,  met  the  emergency.  In  1856,  also, 
when  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Company  were  unwill- 
ing on  simply  business  grounds  to  comply  with  certain 
new  conditions  of  service  between  Suez  and  Australia, 
the  government  at  once  took  the  business  from  them,  and 
accepted  the  tender  of  another  company,  which  afterwards 
failed  most  disastrously,  and  lost  its  entire  capital. 


158  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

Owing,  however,  to  the  long  connection  of  this  great 
steamship  line  with  the  government,  and  the  large 
amounts  of  money  paid  it  from  time  to  time  from  the 
public  treasury  for  its  great  and  varied  service,  the  idea 
has  come  to  prevail,  even  in  England,  that  the  company 
was  not  only  called  into  existence  in  the  first  instance  by 
the  government,  but  also  has  always  been  maintained  by 
it.  But  on  this  point  Mr.  Lindsay,  in  his  History  of  Mer- 
chant Shipping,  speaks  thus  decisively  :  — 

"  The  impression  that  this  company  owed  its  origin  to  government 
grants,  and  that  it  has  been  entirely  maintained  by  subsidies  for  the 
conveyance  of  the  mails,  is  not  supported  by  facts.  Indeed,  during 
the  earlier  portions  of  its  career  the  company,  by  agreeing  to  carry 
the  Peninsular  mails,  shortly  after  it  had  been  started,  for  a  sum  con- 
siderably less  than  the  cost  of  maintaining  the  admiralty  packets  then 
employed,  with  a  speed,  too,  and  regularity  previously  unknown,  con- 
ferred an  undoubted  boon  on  the  public. 

"  Whether  the  company  would  have  continued  to  maintain  its 
career  of  prosperity  without  government  subsidies,  is  a  problem  too 
speculative  for  me  to  solve.  Free  from  the  conditions  required  by 
the  government,  the  company  would  probably  have  done  better  for  its 
shareholders,  had  it  been  at  liberty, to  build  and  sail  its  ships  as  it 
pleased,  despatching  them  on  such  voyages  and  at  such  rates  of 
speed  as  paid  it  best :  and  in  support  of  this  opinion  I  may  remark, 
that  various  other  shipping  companies,  with  no  assistance  whatever 
from  government,  have  yielded  far  larger  dividends  than  the  Peninsu- 
lar and  Oriental;  and,  further,  that  private  ship-owners  who  never 
had  a  mail-bag  in  their  steamers  have  realized  large  fortunes." 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE,  159 

And  again,  after  reviewing  the  fiscal  condition  of  the 
company,  Mr.  Lindsay  continues, — 

"  From  whatever  cause  it  may  have  arisen,  the  fact  is  apparent, 
that,  though  the  annual  gross  receipts  of  the  company  are  enor- 
mous, its  expenditure  is  so  great  that  less  balance  is  left  for  the 
shareholders  than  is  usually  divided  among  those  of  undertakings  of 
a  similar  character  which  receive  no  assistance  from  government,  but 
are  free  to  employ  their  ships  in  whatever  branch  of  commerce  they 
can  be  most  profitably  engaged." 

The  evidence  is  therefore  conclusive,  that  Great  Britain 
has  never  done  what  it  is  proposed  that  the  government 
of  the  United  States  shall  do  ;  namely,  directly  appropriate 
large  amounts  of  the  public  money  for  the  sole  and  ex- 
clusive purpose  of  encouraging  shipping.  The  extent  and 
wide  separation  of  her  dependencies  have  required  her 
to  maintain  a  costly  ocean  mail-service,  involving  large 
payments  to  various  steamship  lines,  which  payments  in 
turn  have  undoubtedly  helped  these  lines,  and  in  some  in- 
stances have  enabled  them  to  run  where  otherwise  they 
would  not.  But  in  every  case  these  payments,  by  what- 
ever name  they  be  designated,  have  been  no  more  than 
was  indispensable  to  secure  the  necessary  mail  or  other 
government  service ;  and  no  act  of  British  legislation  can 
be  cited  to  show  that  money  was  ever  voted  by  Parliament 
for  the  purpose  of  aiding  in  the  construction  and  employ- 
ment of  ships  for  the  British  commercial  marine.  "  And, 
if  the  British  Government  were  to  resolve  to  discontinue 


I6O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

every  possible  patronage  to  its  shipping,  it  could  not 
reduce  its  payment  to  the  extent  of  one  pound ;  and  for 
the  reason  that  all  that  it  pays  is  now  absolutely  neces- 
sary in  order  to  get  the  required  ocean  mail-service."  l 

That  these  conclusions  are  also  in  accord  with  the 
views  of  the  one  witness  who,  above  all  others,  by  reason 
of  his  official  position  in  the  British  Government  and  his 
recognized  eminence  as  a  statesman  and  economist,  must 
be  regarded  as  an  authority,  —  namely,  the  Rt.  Hon.  Henry 

1  At  a  recent  launching  on  the  Clyde  of  one  of  the  new  ships  of  the  Wil- 
liams &  Guion  Line,  Mr.  Guion,  one  of  the  principal  owners,  after  rehearsing 
the  success  of  the  company,  remarked  triumphantly  that  his  corporation 
"  had  never  received  a  penny  of  government  subsidy,  and  felt  no  necessity 
of  it." 

At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Steamship  Com- 
pany, held  in  London,  Dec.  8,  1881,  the  chairman,  referring  to  the  connection 
of  the  company  with  the  British  Post-Office  Department,  also  used  the  fol- 
lowing language : — 

"  Referring  to  the  financial  aspect  of  the  postal-service  contracts,  they  had 
received  .£75,000  less  from  the  present  than  from  the  late  contract,  while  the 
service  they  had  now  to  perform  was  far  more  arduous.  At  the  expiration  of 
the  late  contract  a  very  serious  attempt  was  made  to  wrest  from  them  the 
position  they  had  held  as  contractors  for  the  Eastern  mails  for  forty  years. 
They  had  obtained  the  new  contract,  not  through  any  favoritism,  or  because 
they  had  done  the  work  so  long,  or  on  account  of  the  great  public  services 
which  they  had  rendered  during  their  career,  but  simply  because  the  service 
they  had  offered  was  the  best,  and  the  price  they  had  asked  was  the  lowest. 
It  was  sometimes  said  that  a  mail-service  was  very  easy;  but  he  assured 
them  that  the  service  they  had  to  perform  was  very  difficult,  and  he  was  not 
sure  that  it  was  profitable.  He  was,  however,  sure  that  they  had  had  to 
build  much  more  expensive  vessels  than  the  commercial  character  of  their 
work  required." 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  l6l 

Fawcett,  M.P.,  Professor  of  Political  Economy  in  the 
University  of  Cambridge,  Eng.,  and  present  (1882)  British 
postmaster-general, — will  be  evident  from  the  following 
extract  from  a  recently  (1881)  published  review  by  this 
gentleman  of  the  effects  of  bounties  on  shipping : r  — 

"  Before  leaving  the  subject,  it  may  be  well  to  refer  to  the  fact  that 
such  subsidies  as  these  which  have  been  considered  are  sometimes 
defended  on  the  ground  that  England  gives  similar  assistance  to  her 
shipping  trade  in  the  form  of  postal  subsidies.  It  is,  however,  obvious 
that  there  is  an  essential  difference  between  a  postal  subsidy  and  one 
given  on  the  building  of  a  ship.  In  the  case  of  France  it  is  admitted 
that  the  latter  is  granted  to  compensate  French  ship-builders  for  the 
extra  price  they  have  to  pay  for  materials  in  consequence  of  the  tariff. 
A  postal  subsidy,  on  the  other  hand,  is  simply  a  payment  made  for  the 
conveyance,  under  certain  specified  conditions  as  to  time  and  speed, 
of  postal  matter.  Such  a  payment  may  raise  many  important  ques- 
tions of  administration.  Thus,  on  the  one  hand,  it  has  been  contended 
that  the  State  does  not  receive  a  service  which  is  equivalent  to  the 
amount  paid;  and  that  an  equally  good,  if  not  an  improved  conveyance 
of  the  mails  would  be  secured  if  they  were  treated  more  as  ordinary 
merchandise.  On  the  other  hand,  it  has  been  urged,  that,  without 
some  special  arrangement  being  entered  into,  there  are  many  cases  in 
which  regularity  of  conveyance  would  not  be  insured,  and  that  this 
regularity  is  so  important  that  the  amount  paid  in  the  form  of  a  postal 
subsidy  to  secure  it  represents  a  judicious  outlay  on  the  part  of  the 
State.  Without  expressing  an  opinion  on  the  various  questions  which 
may  thus  be  suggested,  it  is  evident  that  they  raise  issues  very  differ- 
ent from  those  which  are  involved  in  a  discussion  as  to  the  relative 
advantages  of  free  trade  and  protection.  And  as  a  further  proof  that 

1  Free  Trade  and  Protection.  By  Henry  Fawcett,  M.P.  Fourth  edition, 
1881,  pp.  29,  38.  Macmillan  &  Co.,  London. 


1 62  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE, 

postal  subsidies  are  not  granted  with  the  object  of  giving  to  English 
shipping  any  protection  against  the  competition  of  the  shipping  of 
other  countries,  it  maybe  mentioned  that  when  a  contract  for  the 
conveyance  of  mails  is  advertised,  no  restriction  whatever  is  imposed 
upon  any  foreign  vessels  competing;  and  the  subsidy  would  be  paid  to 
foreign  owned  and  foreign  built  vessels  if  it  were  considered  that  the 
best  and  cheapest  conveyance  of  mails  would  thus  be  secured.  For 
some  years  a  subsidy  was  paid  by  the  English  Post  Office  to  a  German 
steamship-company  for  the  conveyance  of  mails  from  Southampton  to 
New  York." 


Recent  Experience  of  France. 

The  commercial  marine  of  France,  having,  in  common 
with  that  of  the  United  States  and  Italy,  lapsed  into 
chronic  decay,  the  French  Government  recently  deter- 
mined to  unreservedly  adopt  the  system  of  bounties  or 
subsidies,  with  a  view  of  restoring  this  department  of  its 
industries ;  and  accordingly,  by  a  law  passed  in  January, 
1 88 1,  it  offered  large  premiums  for  the  building  and  navi- 
gation of  French  vessels,  both  sail  and  steam.  The 
matter  was  previously  thoroughly  discussed  in  the  Na- 
tional Assembly  and  throughout  the  country ;  and  there 
was  no  misconception  on  the  part  of  the  French  public 
in  respect  to  at  least  two  points :  first,  that  the  proposition 
to  offer  bounties  was  in  itself  an  acknowledgment  of  an 
inability  on  the  part  of  France  to  compete  with  other 
maritime  nations ;  and  second,  that,  for  the  purpose  of 
encouraging  the  French  shipping  interest,  an  extra  tax 
of  a  considerable  amount  was  to  be  imposed  upon  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  163 

country  at  large  and  upon  all  its  other  industries.  And 
still  another  point,  specially  worthy  of  note  by  citizens 
of  the  United  States  in  this  connection,  is,  that  the 
new  French  law  did  not  propose,  even  at  the  outset,  or 
embody  in  its  enactment,  any  inhibition  whatever  on  the 
citizens  of  France  from  buying  ships  in  foreign  countries, 
and  making  them  French  property,  in  case  they  desired  to 
-do  so;  but,  on  the  contrary,  it  offers  a  premium  for  so 
doing,  by  giving  one-half  the  subsidy  granted  to  French- 
built  ships  to  vessels  of  foreign  construction  bought  by 
citizens  of  France  and  transferred  to  the  French  flag. 

As  already  stated,  the  French  scheme  of  subventions 
relates  both  to  the  building  and  navigation  of  ships ;  but 
very  different  reasons  are  assigned  in  the  body  of  the  law 
for  the  legislation  in  question  in  respect  to  these  two 
classes  of  industrial  transactions.  Thus,  in  respect  to 
ship-building,  the  act  declares  that  the  subsidies  are 
granted  to  compensate  ship-builders  for  the  duties  on  im- 
ported materials  entering  into  the  construction  of  ships 
in  France;  while  the  subsidies  granted  for  the  employment 
of  vessels  are  asserted  to  be  "for  the  purpose  of  com- 
pensating the  mercantile  navy  for  the  service  it  renders 
the  country  in  the  recruitment  of  the  military  navy." x 


1  The  French  subsidies  granted  for  ship-building  are  estimated  upon  the 
gross  tonnage,  and  are  as  follows  :  For  iron  and  steel  vessels,  60  francs  per 
ton ;  for  wooden  vessels  of  200  tons  or  more,  20  francs  per  ton ;  for  wooden 
vessels  less  than  200  tons,  10  francs  per  ton ;  for  composite  vessels,  40  francs 


1 64  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

The  first  effect  of  the  law  was  to  induce,  with  almost 
feverish  haste,  the  formation  of  a  number  of  new  and 
extensive  steamship  companies ;  and  the  construction  of  a 
number  of  new  and  large  steamers  was  promptly  com- 
menced and  rapidly  pushed  forward  in  various  French 
ports,  as  well  as  in  the  shipyards  of  Great  Britain.  But  as 
all  these  enterprises  are  in  effect  guaranteed  against  loss 
by  the  government,  and  as  any  business  they  may  do  is  so 
much  gain,  they  are  of  necessity  essentially  speculative  in 
character.  And  that  they  are  so  regarded  by  the  capital- 
ists that  have  embarked  in  them,  is  made  evident  by  the 
business  they  propose  to  do ;  one  line,  for  example,  hav- 
ing been  formed  to  trade  between  Havre  and  the  Southern 
Seas,  and  another  to  run  on  a  long  circuitous  voyage  be- 
tween France,  Quebec,  Halifax,  St.  Thomas,  and  Brazil. 

The  results  of  the  first  year's  experience  of  this  French 
system,  so  far  as  reported,  have  not  proved  satisfactory. 


per  ton  ;  for  engines  placed  on  board  steamers,  and  for  auxiliary  apparatus, 
boilers,  pipes,  etc.,  12  francs  per  100  kilograms. 

The  navigation  bounty  is  fixed  at  i  franc  50  centimes  per  registered  ton 
per  1,000  miles  run  for  new  vessels.  It  is  confined  to  vessels  engaged  in 
foreign  trade,  and  is  to  be  reduced  annually  during  a  period  of  ten  years, 
when  it  will  cease.  For  foreign-built  vessels  the  bounty  is  reduced  one-half 
of  the  above  assigned  amounts.  Vessels  taking  out  French  registers  before 
the  promulgation  of  this  law  are  to  be  regarded  as  vessels  of  French  construc- 
tion. The  navigation  bounty  is  increased  15  percent  in  the  case  of  vessels 
built  according  to  plans  approved  by  the  French  Marine  Department. 
Vessels  receiving  bounties  are  required  to  carry  the  French  mails  and  post- 
office  agents  free  of  charge. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  165 

Bounties  were  granted  for  the  encouragement  of  voyages 
between  French  ports,  the  French  colonies,  and  coun- 
tries out  of  Europe;  but  the  returns  for  1881  show  a  very 
marked  decrease  in  the  French  tonnage  engaged  in  her 
colonial  trade  as  compared  with  1 880,  when  there  were  no 
bounties ;  while  the  French  tonnage  entries  into  French 
ports  from  foreign  countries  showed  a  decrease  in  1881  as 
compared  with  1880,  with  some  marked  gain  in  the  same 
time  in  respect  to  clearances.  But  what  is  most  notice- 
able is,  that  the  entries  and  clearances  of  foreign  tonnage 
(which  of  course  receives  no  bounty)  into  French  ports 
during  1881  showed  a  very  large  increase  as  compared 
with  1880,  and  was  apparently  in  no  ways  affected  by  the 
new  and  discriminating  privileges  extended  to  French 
shipping  in  order  to  enable  it  to  successfully  compete  for 
foreign  business. 

Recent  Experience  of  Germany. 

Impressed,  and  apparently  favorably,  with  the  plan 
adopted  by  the  French  Government  for  the  encourage- 
ment of  its  merchant  shipping,  the  German  Government, 
under  the  auspices  of  Prince  Bismarck,  submitted  during 
the  past  year  (1881)  an  exhibit  of  the  French  law  to  the 
Reichstag,  and  accompanied  it  with  the  question,  "  if  it 
was  not  worthy  the  serious  consideration  of  that  body, 
whether  under  the  present  circumstances  German  naviga- 
tion and  trade  will  be  able  to  thrive  and  to  compete  with 
those  of  other  nations  aided  by  state  subsidies  ? "  Thus 


1 66  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

far  the  "  Reichstag  "  has  taken  no  action  on  the  subject  ; 
but  the  proposal  to  meet  French  subsidies  to  French  ship- 
ping with  German  subsidies  to  German  shipping  promptly 
called  out  most  energetic  protests  from  the  merchants  of 
not  only  the  old  Hanse  towns  of  Hamburg  and  Bremen, 
but  also  from  all  the  other  German  seaports  on  the  Baltic 
and  North  Seas,  with,  it  is  stated,  the  simple  exception  of 
the  small  and  almost  insignificant  port  of  Papenburg,  in 
the  Duchy  -of  Oldenburg.  And,  as  a  specimen  of  these 
protests,  the  following  translation  of  that  of  the  "  Ham- 
burg Respectable  Merchants'  Society "  ("  der  ehrbare 
Kaufmann  ")  is  submitted  :  — 

•  "  Thus  far,"  after  a  formal  preliminary,  it  says,  "  German  com- 
merce and  navigation  have  been  able  to  compete  with  those  of  other 
nations,  and  their  present  strong  position  is  chiefly  due  to  their  own 
exertions.  Even  if  the  French  Government  should  extend  larger 
monopolies  and  subsidies  to  their  national  trade  and  commerce,  the 
Hamburg  shipping  merchants  are  not  afraid,  that,  if  let  alone,  their 
own  development  would  be  injured  or  suffer  under  such  adverse  legis- 
lation. The  growth  and  prosperity  of  national  trade  are,  before  all, 
created  by  the  natural  talent  and  disposition  of  a  people.  Govern- 
mental measures,  whether  they  consist  in  throwing  artificial  obstacles 
in  the  way  of  foreign  competition  or  in  direct  support  of  the  national 
flag,  may  here  and  there  bring  temporary  advantages  to  individual 
enterprises;  but  they  will  never  be  able  permanently  to  raise  and  ele- 
vate the  shipping  interest.  On  the  contrary,  as  experience  has  shown 
in  France,  they  paralyze  individual  energy,  and  endanger7  the  spirit  of 
enterprise,  and  effect  the  decline,  if  not  the  ruin,  of  trade.  In  the 
interest  of  German  commerce  and  of  the  national  flag,  the  Hamburg 
merchants  most  earnestly  and  respectfully  pray  that  all  governmental 
measures  for  their  protection  be  definitively  set  aside." 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

The  German  Government  at  present  contributes  noth- 
ing in  the  way  of  aid  to  her  commercial  marine,  but  pays 
for  postal  freight  forwarded  by  her  steamers  about  200,000 
marks  per  annum.  Nevertheless  the  German  shipping 
interests  —  represented  especially  by  a  splendid  fleet  of 
merchant  steamships  built  mainly  in  Great  Britain  —  are 
most  prosperous  ;  although  Germany  by  situation  and  tra- 
ditions can  hardly  be  regarded  as  a  maritime  nation.  Italy, 
with  a  decaying  marine,  is  reported  as  paying  annually 
$1,500,000  as  a  contribution  for  her  steamship  service. 
The  annual  payments  of  Austria  for  the  same  object 
are  reported  at  $500,000,  while  in  the  case  of  Belgium  and 
Holland  the  contributions  are  very  inconsiderable. 

A  Repeal  of  our  Navigation  Laws  not  alone  Sufficient  to 
Arrest  the  Decadence  of  American  Shipping. 

We  come,  finally,  to  the  third  objection  made  to  the 
repeal  of  the  navigation  laws ;  namely,  that  the  repeal 
would  not  effect  the  end  desired,  or  the  restoration  of  the 
American  shipping  interest.  In  this  objection,  it  must  be 
admitted,  there  is  much  of  validity.  For,  apart  from  the 
restrictions  involved  in  our  navigation  code,  the  ownership 
and  use  of  ships  has  been  clogged  and  burdened  with  so 
many  other  onerous  conditions  in  the  United  States,  that, 
were  the  right  to  purchase  and  use  ships  of  foreign  con- 
struction at  once  fully  and  freely  conceded  to  our  citizens, 
their  successful  employment  in  competition  with  vessels 
under  foreign  flags  engaged  in  foreign  trade  would  be  not 


168  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

a  little  difficult,  if  not  altogether  impossible.  Neverthe- 
less, the  repeal  of  our  navigation  laws  is  the  first  step  to 
be  taken  ;  and,  in  default  of  this,  nothing  practical  can  be 
done  for  the  relief  of  our  American  shipping.  So  long  as 
our  ship-builders  are  effectually  shielded  from  the  effects 
of  foreign  competition,  they  will  never,  we  may  be  sure, 
build  ships  at  the  lowest  possible  cost.  It  is  but  human 
nature  for  them  not  to  do  it.  With  the  navigation  laws 
repealed,  some  ships  will  at  once  be  purchased  and  put 
into  profitable  use.  One  of  the  Southern  railroads, 
adapted  for  the  carrying  of  cotton  from  the  interior  to  a 
seaboard  port,  some  time  since,  would  very  gladly  have 
put  on  a  line  of  freight  (cotton)  steamers  from  their  termi- 
nus to  New  York,  if  the  proper  ships  could  be  obtained  at 
a  satisfactory  cost.  Such  ships  cannot  now  be  had  in  the 
United  States  ;  but  the  company  can  procure  them  exceed- 
ingly cheap,  because  of  old  but  desirable  pattern  for  the 
business  in  question,  in  England.  But,  as  foreign-built 
ships  cannot  participate  in  the  coasting  trade,  the  pro- 
ject necessarily  had  to  be  abandoned,  and  with  it  the  de- 
velopment of  a  new  local  Southern  industry.  When  the 
Chinese  ports  and  inland  navigation  were  first  opened  to 
foreigners,  American  capital  and  enterprise  at  once  intro- 
duced light  and  fleet  steamers  of  the  American  pattern  to 
do  the  business  before  transacted  by  the  slow  and  unwieldy 
junks,  and  for  a  time  held  almost  the  monopoly  of  trans- 
portation for  freights  and  passengers  on  certain  routes. 
As  the  steamers,  however,  wore  out,  it  became  desirable 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  169 

to  replace  them  with  English-built  iron  steamers  of  im- 
proved pattern ;  but  as  such  steamers  could  not  fly  the 
American  flag,  or  be  entitled  to  protection  from  the 
American  diplomatic  and  consular  representatives  in 
China,  or  fly  the  British  flag  without  passing  under  Brit- 
ish control,  and  as  the  Chinese  flag  and  protection  were 
not  desirable,  a  large  and  profitable  business  established 
by  Americans  was  gradually  abandoned,  and  permitted  to 
pass  into  the  hands  of  the  representatives  of  other  nation- 
alities. But,  had  there  been  no  home  navigation  code  to 
prevent,  the  American  flag  would  doubtless  now  be  most 
prominent  on  the  Chinese  coast  and  inland  waters,  and 
large  profits  would  have  accrued  to  American  seamen  and 
capitalists.1 

Repeal,  then,  our  navigation  laws,  and  abandon  both 
the  idea  and  the  proposition  to  reward  men  by  grants  of 
money  for  building  the  dearest  ships  in  the  world,  and  a 
leverage  is  at  once  gained  for  the  removal  of  other  obsta- 
cles and  abuses. 

Without  repeal,  the  decay  of  our  merchant  marine  will 
continue  from  bad  to  worse,  until  within  a  very  few  years 
our  flag  will  substantially  vanish  from  the  ocean.  With 

1  Of  the  tonnage  employed  in  coast  and  river  trade  between  the  treaty 
ports  of  China,  40  per  cent  was  reported  as  once  bearing  the  flag  of  the 
United  States.  At  present  this  trade  is  nearly  equally  divided  between  Brit- 
ish and  Chinese  bottoms;  and,  according  to  a  recent  consular  report  to  the 
State  Department  at  Washington,  there  is  now  but  one  small  steamer  upon 
the  whole  coast  of  Eastern  Asia  that  carries  our  flag. 


I/O  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

repeal,  we  shall  be  encouraged  to  greater  efforts,  and  shall 
at  least  have  sufficient  of  hope  given  us  for  the  future  to 
warrant  our  continuing  to  use  the  anchor  as  one  of  the 
emblems  of  American  industry. 

To  the  nature  of  these  further  obstacles  it  is  next  pro- 
posed to  ask  attention. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  I?I 


CHAPTER    IX. 

OBSTACLES  IN  THE  WAY  OF  THE  RESTORATION  OF  THE 
MERCHANT  MARINE  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES,  OTHER 
THAN  OUR  NAVIGATION  LAWS. 

As  already  stated,  it  would  be  an  error  to  suppose  that 
a  repeal  of  our  navigation  laws  will  at  once  and  alone 
re-create  our  commercial  marine.  The  repeal  is  the  first 
step  to  be  taken.  It  is  the  indispensable  step.  It  will 
be  the  beginning  of  a  new  era  of  prosperity  for  our 
shipping  interests.  But  through  long  public  indiffer- 
ence to  this  subject,  through  actual  hostility  to  ships  and 
foreign  commerce  (as  will  be  hereafter  proved),  through 
the  habit  of  disregarding  the  results  of  thorough  economic 
investigations,  and  styling  the  men  who  make  them  as 
theorists  and  unpractical,  and  the  man  of  business,  who 
in  nine  cases  out  of  ten  works  in  a  limited  sphere,  knows 
little  beyond  that  sphere,  and  rarely  stops  to  study,  in- 
vestigate, or  generalize,  as  the  practical  one  whose  advice 
and  counsel  is  always  to  have  the  preference,  —  through 
all  these  agencies  there  has  been  created  a  series  of  other 
obstacles  in  the  way  of  the  profitable  employment  of 
American  vessels  in  foreign  commerce,  so  serious  and 
destructive,  that  if  ships  of  the  best  foreign  construction 


s 


172  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

were  to-day  put  down  at  our  wharves  as  free  gifts,  their 
use  in  competition  with  vessels  under  foreign  flags  would 
be  attended  with  not  a  little  of  embarrassment,  if  not 
wholly  impracticable. 

The  Obstacle  of  Local  Taxation. 

The  most  serious  of  these  obstacles  grows  out  of  the 
system  of  State  or  local  taxation  generally  adopted  in  the 
several  States  in  the  Federal  Union  ;  and  which,  starting 
with  the  theory  that  in  order  to  tax  equitably  it  is  neces- 
sary to  tax  every  thing,  includes  in  the  assessment  lists 
real  and  personal  property,  things  tangible  and  intangible, 
the  visible,  corporeal  substance,  the  product  of  labor,  and 
the  invisible,  incorporeal  title,  which  only  represents,  and 
is  not  itself  the  product  of  labor  any  more  than  a  shadow 
is  the  substance.  Under  such  system,  the  like  of  which 
does  not  exist  in  any  other  country  on  the  face  of  the 
globe,  and  which  of  necessity  breaks  down  in  application 
because  the  law  cannot  provide  clairvoyant  assessors, 
gifted  to  see  what  cannot  be  seen  and  to  touch  what  is 
not  tangible,  ships  are  taxed  as  personal  property  to  their 
owners. 

The  manner  now  in  which  local  taxes  work  to  the  dis- 
advantage of  American  shipping  and  commercial  interests 
may  be  thus  illustrated  :  Let  us  suppose  the  projection  of 
a  new  line  of  steamships  to  run  between  the  United  States 
and  Europe  in  competition  with  existing  lines,  now  con- 
trolled by  foreign  capitalists  and  registered  under  a  foreign 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE,  1/3 

flag.  If  the  nationality  of  the  company  is  to  be  American, 
and  its  location  any  one  of  our  leading  Atlantic  cities,  — 
except  Philadelphia, j — the  taxation,  until  within  the  past 
year,  on  the  whole  capital  or  property  of  the  company — 
ships,  wharves,  machine-shops,  offices,  and  floating  capital 
—  would  have  been  from  1.50  to  2.50,  or  even  greater  per 
cent,  on  a  pretty  full  valuation.1 

Furthermore,  until  recently,  the  National  Government 
would  have  preferred  an  average  tax  under  the  tariff  of 
about  forty  per  cent  on  all  articles  of  foreign  production 
entering  into  the  construction  of  vessels ;  and,  as  a  con- 
sequence, it  advanced  the  price  of  similar  articles  of 
domestic  production  to  an  equal  or  nearly  corresponding 
extent.  By  the  Act  of  June,  1872,  however,  articles  of 

1  The  State  of  Pennsylvania,  when  she,  some  years  ago,  incorporated  a 
local  transatlantic  steamship  company  having  its  situs  in  Philadelphia,  judi- 
ciously exempted  all  ships  engaged  in  foreign  trade,  as  well  as  all  other  prop- 
erty —  stocks,  bonds,  etc.  —  of  the  company  in  question,  from  all  State 
taxation;  and,  during  the  year  1881,  the  States  of  New  York  and  Massa- 
chusetts also  exempted  ships  owned  by  their  citizens,  and  engaged  in  foreign 
trade,  from  all  direct  State  taxation.  In  all,  or  nearly  all,  of  the  other  States, 
the  taxation  of  vessels,  whether  engaged  in  foreign  trade  or  otherwise, 
is,  however,  still  maintained ;  and  the  following  illustration  of  its  working 
in  Illinois,  and  on  the  shipping  of  the  Lakes,  has  recently  been  brought 
forward  in  Chicago.  Thus  a  wooden  sailing-vessel,  it  is  stated,  built  to  carry 
grain  through  the  Welland  Canal,  costs  about  twenty  thousand  dollars.  This 
vessel,  if  owned  in  Chicago,  would  be  assessed  by  the  local  authorities  at  ten 
thousand  dollars ;  and  at  the  rate  of  five  per  cent  —  State  and  city  tax  rate  for 
1880  —  the  amount  chargeable  would  be  five  hundred  dollars.  The  same 
vessel,  if  owned  in  Canada,  would  not  pay  any  thing  directly,  nor  in  Liverpool 
apart  from  an  income  tax  on  the  profits  of  the  owners  individually. 


1/4  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

foreign  growth  or  production,  "necessary  for  the  construc- 
tion and  equipment  of  vessels  built  in  the  United  States 
for  the  purpose  of  being  engaged  in  foreign  trade,"  may 
be  imported  in  bond  free  of  duty ;  but  vessels  receiving 
the  benefit  of  this  provision  are  not  allowed  to  engage  in 
the  coastwise  trade  of  the  United  States  for  more  than 
two  months  in  any  one  year.  As  one  consequence  of 
this  restriction,  a  New  York  ship-owner  stated  at  the  meet- 
ing of  the  National  Board  of  Trade  in  December,  1880, 
that,  having  occasion  to  send  a  vessel  built  for  foreign 
trade  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans  for  temporary  em- 
ployment, he  was  obliged,  before  he  could  do  it,  to  pay  four 
hundred  dollars  for  duties  on  the  suit  of  metal  which  had 
been  previously  placed  on  the  ship's  bottom  ;  or  he  was, 
in  fact,  fined  to  this  extent  for  using  his  own  property  in  a 
perfectly  honest  but  not  lawful  industry. 

For  some  years  after  the  war,  also,  when  the  shipping 
interest  of  the  United  States  engaged  in  foreign  trade  had 
suffered  exceptionally  from  the  inability  of  the  Govern- 
ment to  protect  it  from  Confederate  cruisers,  and  when 
it  therefore  needed  the  kindliest  and  most  fostering  care, 
income  taxes  were  imposed  on  the  incomes  of  ship-owners 
(if  they  perchance  happened  to  have  any),  and,  in  ad- 
dition, heavy  taxes  on  the  gross  receipts  of  their  entire 
business,  and  upon  every  passenger  ticket  by  them  sold. 
When  the  largest  possible  damage  had  been  effected,  these 
national  taxes  were  repealed.  But  the  practice  of  Great 
Britain  and  other  nations  of  allowing  vessels  employed  in 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1/5 

foreign  commerce  to  take  stores  for  voyage  consumption 
out  of  bond,  iree  of  duty,  has  not  as  yet  been  thought 
worthy  of  imitation ;  and,  as  a  consequence,  the  cost  of 
ship-supplies  in  the  United  States  was  reported  by  a  com- 
mittee of  Congress  a  few  years  ago  to  be  about  twenty  per 
cent  in  the  aggregate  in  excess  of  the  cost  of  supplies  to 
vessels  of  Great  Britain. 

If  now,  on  the  other  hand,  the  situs  of  the  prospective 
new  steamship  company  is  made  foreign,  and  its  location 
fixed  at  Liverpool,  the  whole  amount  of  local  taxation  to 
which  the  company  would  be  subjected  would  be  merely 
an  assessment  to  the  extent  of  from  ten  to  twenty-five  per 
cent  on  the  rental  —  not  capital  —  value  of  the  premises 
occupied  either  as  offices,  storehouses,  or  machine-shops. 
Beyond  this  the  British  Government  would  levy  an  income- 
tax  on  the  profits  (if  any)  of  the  shareholders  or  owners, 
as  individuals,  to  the  extent  of  from  one  to  two  per  cent, 
and,  omitting  all  other  forms  of  direct  taxation,  would  allow 
all  articles  subject  to  taxation,  either  under  the  excise  or 
tariff,  such  as  distilled  spirits,  te^s,  coffee,  wines,  and 
tobacco,  which  may  be  required  for  use  on  board  the 
steamer  in  question,  to  be  taken  from  bond  free  of  duty. 
The  difference  in  the  return  on  the  investment,  therefore, 
growing  out  of  the  difference  merely  in  the  fiscal  systems 
recognized  in  the  different  locations  specified,  would  be 
of  itself  sufficient  to  afford  to  the  foreign  capitalist  a 
dividend  on  his  stock  equal  to  at  least  one-half  of  the 
ordinary  rate  of  European  interest  on  the  capital  em- 


1/6  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

ployed ;  while  to  the  American  investor  the  disadvantage 
would  have  at  least  an  expression  twofold  greater  through 
an  increase  of  expenses  and  a  diminution  of  profit  which 
can  be  traced  directly  to  a  system  of  taxation  which  has 
enhanced  the  price  of  every  thing  that  has  entered  into 
the  steamer,  from  the  laying  of  her  keel  to  the  coal  that 
feeds  her  engines.  In  Great  Britain  and  other  countries 
it  is  furthermore  to  be  noted  that  the  ownership  of  a  ship 
that  is  idle  and  not  earning,  or  employed  and  not  earning, 
does  not  entail  any  burden  of  taxation ;  but  in  the  United 
States  it  makes  no  difference  whether  the  ship  be  at  work 
or  idle,  profitably  or  unprofitably  employed,  she  pays  taxes 
all  the  same.1 

With  competition  with  foreign  nations  on  terms  of 
equality  being,  therefore,  from  the  very  outset,  not  less 
by  State  than  by  Federal  laws,  rendered  impossible,  is  it 
to  be  wondered  at  that  the  American  ocean  marine  has 

1  The  above  illustration  of  the  difference  of  taxation  in  the  case  of  domes- 
tic and  foreign  steamships  was  first  presented  to  the  public  by  the  writer  in  a 
report  to  the  Legislature  of  New  York  on  local  taxation  in  1871,  and  has 
since  been  used  by  him  in  other  essays  on  the  same  subject.  No  one 
questioned  then,  or  has  questioned  since,  the  accuracy  of  the  statements ;  and 
yet,  until  within  a  very  recent  period,  the  presentation  of  the  above  embodied 
facts  has  produced  no  more  effect  on  legislative  assemblies  —  National  or 
State  —  than  if  the  same  number  of  words  had  been  written  in  Sanscrit. 
Boards  of  trade,  commercial  conventions,  and  legislative  assemblies  continued, 
however,  to  pass  resolutions  all  the  same,  deploring  the  decay  of  American 
shipping,  and  recommending  a  liberal  grant  of  subsidies  to  set  matters  right 
again,  and  doubtless  considered  their  duties  discharged  in  expressing  their 
sentiments. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  177 

declined  almost  to  extinction,  or  that  there  are  so  few 
mechanical  establishments  in  the  United  States  capable 
of  building  or  repairing  first-class  steamships  ? 

As,  however,  to  some  minds,  the  fact  that  foreign  coun- 
tries exempt  their  shipping  from  all  direct  taxation  as 
property,  may  not  seem  conclusive  in  favor  of  allowing 
a  similar  exemption  of  similar  property  in  the  United 
States,  it  may  be  well  at  this  point  to  ask  attention  to 
what  may  be  termed  the  common-sense  theory  of  taxation. 
Thus,  taxes,  it  must  be  admitted,  are  the  consideration 
which  persons  and  property  pay  for  the  protection  of  the 
State;  for  unless  life,  liberty,  and  property  are  made 
reasonably  secure,  production  will  not  go  forward.  The 
soldier  or  policeman  guards  while  the  laborer  or  artisan 
performs  his  labor  in  safety.  The  State  is  always,  there- 
fore, an  important  partner  in  all  production  ;  and  in  every 
equitable  system  of  taxation  the  taxes  paid  will  form  a 
part  of  the  cost  of  all  production,  and  enter  into  and  con- 
stitute a  part  of  the  market  value  of  all  products.  If,  now, 
the  State  does  not  give  to  the  citizen  the  protection  he 
needs  in  return  for  his  taxes,  the  levy  which  the  State 
makes  upon  the  property  of  the  citizen  is  not  entitled  to 
be  called  taxation,  but  is  spoliation,  plunder,  or  the  arbi- 
trary taking  of  property  without  compensation.  Everybody 
can  see  this,  if  the  citizen  after  paying  for  policemen  is 
robbed  with  impunity  ;  if,  after  paying  for  courts  and  con- 
gresses to  make  and  administer  just  laws,  he  is  deprived 
of  lawful  liberty ;  if,  after  paying  for  an  army  and  navy,  he 


i;8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

is  made  needlessly  subject  to  inroads  from  foreign  foes. 
But  people  do  not  so  readily  see  that  the  same  principle  of 
spoliation  is  involved  when  the  State  allows  untaxed  prop- 
erty to  be  brought  into  free  competition  and  use  with 
property  of  the  same  description  and  use  which  it  has 
caused  to  be  burdened  with  taxes.  What  sort  of  compe- 
tition would  there  be,  for  example,  in  the  dry-goods  trade, 
if  Chicago  assessed  a  rate  of  5  per  cent,  or  New  York 
City  one  of  2.3  per  cent,  on  all  the  dry-goods  stores  bear- 
ing even  street-numbers,  and  entirely  exempted  from  all 
taxation  all  the  corresponding  stores  bearing  uneven 
numbers?  The  merchants  of  the  first  class  would  be 
crushed :  there  would  be  a  popular  outcry  against  so 
manifest  an  injustice,  and  the  courts  would  promptly 
compel  the  assessors  to  do  equity.  And  yet  the  personal 
tax  on  resident  owners  of  ships  in  various  States  of  the 
Federal  Union,  while  there  is  freedom  from  taxation  of 
competing  ships  engaged  in  the  same  foreign  trade  but 
owned  in  Montreal,  England,  France,  and  other  countries, 
where  ships  are  untaxed,  is  no  different.  In  the  one  case 
it  is  not  a  tax  on  the  dry-goods  business,  and  the  other  it 
is  not  a  tax  on  ships,  but  an  arbitrary  spoliation  of  the 
even-numbered  merchant  and  the  resident  ship-owner. 
In  this  light,  does  it  not,  we  ask,  seem  incredible  that  a 
tax  so  unjust  and  offensive  should  exist  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  or  be  enforced  against  respectable  ship-owners, 
guilty  of  no  crime, — unless  residence  is  such,  —  and  en- 
titled in  justice  to  the  protecxioa  ot  the  law? 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  179 

Obstruction    of    Tonnage-Taxes,    Consular    Fees,    Pilot- 
Charges,  etc. 

Tonnage-taxes  on  shipping  are  not  levied  by  Great 
Britain,  nor,  it  is  believed,  by  any  other  of  the  maritime 
states  of  Europe,  except  Spain.  Prior  to  the  war,  also, 
there  were  no  tonnage-taxes  in  the  United  States ;  and 
their  enactment  in  1862  was  due  simply  and  exclusively 
to  the  urgent  necessities  of  the  government  for  revenue 
occasioned  by  the  war.  Those  necessities  having  long 
since  passed,  there  is  no  good  or  sufficient  reason  for  the 
continuance  of  such  taxes.  The  rates  imposed  on  Ameri- 
can and  foreign  vessels  being  substantially  the  same, 
American  vessels  would  not  seem  to  be  relatively  at  a 
disadvantage  with  foreign  vessels  on  account  of  these 
taxes.  But  really  they  are;  inasmuch  as  in  the  one  c*ase 
the  effect  of  the  tax  is  generally  to  reduce  realized  profits, 
while  in  the  other  it  constitutes,  under  existing  circum- 
tances,  an  obstacle,  as  will  be  presently  shown,  in  the 
way  of  realizing  any  profits  at  all. 

According  to  British  maritime  rules,  the  tonnage  ca- 
pacity of  vessels  is  reckoned  on  only  such  space  as  is 
available  for  cargo ;  and  in  the  measurement  of  vessels  for 
the  ascertainment  of  their  capacity,  allowance  is  made  for 
the  space  occupied  for  the  accommodation  of  the  officers 
and  crew  and  also  by  the  machinery.  In  the  United 
States  the  space  occupied  by  the  water-closets  and  galley 
are  alone  exempted  from  admeasurement ;  and  as  a  conse- 


180  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

quence,  American  vessels  are  at  a  disadvantage  as  com- 
pared with  British  shipping  in  respect  to  tonnage  and 
harbor  dues  and  light-money  in  ports  where  such  taxes 
are  levied.  Moreover,  a  sailing-vessel  which  enters  an 
American  port  once  a  year  is  obliged  to  pay  as  much 
tonnage-tax  as  a  steamer  that  enters  the  same  port  every 
month ;  and  if  in  a  given  line  a  steamer  which  has  paid 
her  tonnage-taxes  for  a  year  becomes  disabled,  and  is 
withdrawn  during  the  first  month  of  the  year,  the  substi- 
tute steamer  must  pay  tonnage  all  the  same  for  another 
full  year. 

The  charges  of  our  consular  system  are  claimed  to  be 
another  weighty  burden  on  American  shipping  engaged 
in  foreign  trade.1  These  fees  are  all  fixed  by  Congress, 
are  paid  into  the  United  States  Treasury,  and  have  evi- 
dently been  arranged  with  the  idea  of  riot  only  rendering 
the  United  States  consular  system  self-sustaining,  but  of 
also  making  it  (as  it  actually  is)  a  source  of  national  reve- 
nue. Now,  so  long  as  the  Federal  Government  was  in 
urgent  need  of  revenue,  the  policy  of  making  our  consular 
system  self-supporting  was  defensible ;  but  with  an  annual 
revenue  so  far  in  excess  of  the  needs  of  the  government 
that  the  disposal  of  the  surplus  is  a  source  of  difficulty 
and  a  temptation  to  waste  and  extravagance,  the  continued 
levy  of  special  taxes,  in  the  form  of  excessive  and  un- 

1  By  virtue  of  a  provision  attached  to  an  appropriation  bill  passed  by 
Congress  in  1880,  the  consular  fees  of  the  United  States  were  made  conform- 
able to  the  standard  adopted  by  Great  Britain. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  l8l 

necessary  consular  fees,  on  an  interest  so  unfortunate 
and  depressed  as  American  shipping,  is  without  justifica- 
tion. 

Again,  under  the  present  United  States  system  of  ap- 
pointing consuls  for  political  reasons  mainly,  and  with  a 
knowledge  on  the  part  of  these  officials  that  their  term  of 
office  is  always  uncertain  and  generally  short,  there  is 
little  inducement  for  good  and  intelligent  service ;  and,  as 
a  rule,  every  construction  of  law  unfavorable  to  the  ship- 
owner, and  advantageous  to  the  consul  or  the  government, 
is  taken  advantage  of,  and  generally  submitted  to  by  the 
victims,  as  involving  less  expense  and  trouble  than  the 
seeking  and  obtaining  of  redress  through  an  appeal  to  the 
State  Department  at  Washington.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  British  consul  is  certain  of  his  position  during  good 
behavior  and  competency ;  and  he  also  knows  that  he 
stands  in  direct  line  of  promotion  under  the  civil-service 
system  of  his  country.  The  consequence  is,  that  Great 
Britain  has  a  host  of  faithful  and  experienced  consuls, 
men  who  feel  the  importance  of  looking  out  for  the  inter- 
ests of  their  own  commerce,  and  do  so  both  from  a  sense 
of  duty  and  a  sense  of  patriotism. 

Compulsory  pilotage,  the  three  months'  extra  pay  to 
crews  discharged  in  foreign  lands,  and  the  obligatory 
employment  of  government  officials  for  the  shipment  of 
sailors  in  American  ports,  are  all'  barnacles  also  which 
impede  the  progress  of  our  commercial  marine,  and  require 
to  be  speedily  scraped  off  as  a  pre-requisite  to  its  full 
development. 


1 82  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

By  a  system  of  compulsory  dues  on  incoming  and  out- 
going vessels  (from  which  only  the  coasting  service  is 
exempt)  the  Sandy  Hook  pilot-service  of  the  port  of  New 
York,  which  consists  of  133  New  York  and  58  New  Jersey 
pilots,  derives  a  yearly  income  from  the  commerce  of  that 
port  of  $800,000  to  $1,000,000.  The  specific  amounts 
charged  are  said  to  be  two  and  a  half  times  in  excess  of 
what  is  paid  in  Liverpool  for  similar  service ;  and  at  the 
Shipping  Convention  at  Boston  in  October,  1880,  Mr. 
James  E.  Ward  of  New  York  stated  that  his  firm  "  paid 
as  large  an  amount  for  pilotage  into  New  York  Harbor  as 
they  did  to  the  captain  of  his  steamship  for  sailing  the 
vessel  all  the  way  to  Cuba  and  back,  facing  all  the 
dangers  of  the  seas  and  the  risk  of  contagion  in  Cuba." 
These  compulsory  pilot-charges  contribute  to  make  New 
York  one  of  the  most  expensive  ports  for  shipping  in  the 
world ;  and  it  does  not  look  hopeful  for  the  consummation 
of  any  plans  for  the  restoration  of  our  shipping  when  it  is 
remembered,  that  although  the  merchants  of  New  York 
have  for  years  petitioned  the  Legislature  on  the  subject, 
and  have  presented  their  case  in  the  most  conclusive 
manner,  they  have  not  yet  been  able  to  obtain  any  redress 
for  this  grievance. 

The  complaint  of  the  so-called  "  Three  Months'  Wages 
Law "  is  founded  upon  a  Federal  statute  enacted  as  far 
back  as  1803,  when  there  was  comparatively  little  commu- 
nication between  the  United  States  and  various  foreign 
countries ;  and  which  provides,  that,  whenever  a  sailor  is 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  183 

discharged  from  an  American  vessel  in  a  foreign  port,  he 
shall  be  paid  three  months'  extra  wages.  The  original 
intent  of  this  law  was  good,  and  was  to  prevent  seamen 
from  being  left  alone  and  destitute  in  a  strange  port ;  but 
now,  when  vessels  are  constantly  going  into  and  coming 
out  of  every  civilized  port  in  the  world,  and  the  great 
mass  of  sailors,  being  of  foreign  nationality,  are  as  much 
at  home  at  one  port  as  another,  there  is  no  longer  any 
necessity  for  its  continuance,  inasmuch  as  there  is  no 
danger  that  any  able-bodied  seaman  will  ever  lack  oppor- 
tunities for  employment  in  any  port  at  any  time.  Under 
existing  circumstances  the  law  subserves  little  other  pur- 
pose than  to  furnish  a  never-ending  source  of  dispute  and 
bad  temper  between  captains,  crews,  and  consular  officers, 
and  ought  to  be  repealed. 

In  addition  to  the  burdens  and  grievances  above  noticed, 
to  which  the  merchant  marine  of  the  United  States  is 
subjected,  there  has  also  grown  up,  under  our  national 
policy  of  ignorance  and  neglect,  a  host  of  other  petty  and 
vexatious  taxes  on  shipping,  the  nature  of  which  can  be 
best  illustrated  by  recounting  the  experience  of  a  vessel 
entering  or  clearing  from  the  port  of  New  York,  the 
point  where  in  1880  nearly  57  per  cent  of  the  entire 
foreign  commerce  of  the  country  was  concentrated. 

After  the  pilot,  whose  charges  range  from  $3.70  per 
foot  for  vessels  drawing  13  feet  of  water,  to  $6.50  per  foot 
for  vessels  in  excess  of  20  feet  draught,  comes  the  health- 
officer,  whose  fee  for  inspection,  and  permit  to  proceed 


1 84  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

into  port,  is  $6.50  for  sailing-vessels.  The  "  boarding-offi- 
cer," a  custom-house  inspector,  is  the  next  to  board  the 
vessel ;  but  for  his  services  no  charge  is  made.  Then 
comes  the  harbor-master;  and  under  State  laws  he  is  al- 
lowed a  fee  of  ii  cents  per  ton  on  the  tonnage  of  each 
vessel, — a  rate  which  varies  in  the  ports  of  the  different 
States.  Then  every  sailing-master  is  required  to  go  to 
the  custom-house  as  soon  as  his  vessel  arrives,  and  pay 
certain  charges  and  small  fees.  Both  foreign  and  Ameri- 
can vessels  must  pay  $3.17  fee  when  their  cargoes  are  not 
dutiable,  and  $5.50  when  the  cargoes  are  dutiable.  The 
amount  returned  for  the  year  1881,  as  collected  under  the 
head  of  customs-officers'  fees  and  services,  was  $720,265. 
Vessels  in  excess  of  100  tons  burden  pay  a  tonnage-tax 
once  a  year  at  the  rate  of  30  cents  per  ton ;  and  the  amount 
collected  under  this  head  for  1881  was  about  $280,000. 
Each  American  vessel  in  addition  is  also  required  to  pay 
hospital  dues  of  40  cents  per  month  per  man,  payments 
to  be  made  each  time  that  a  vessel  enters.  These  dues 
are  for  the  support  of  the  marine-hospital  service  of  the 
United  States,  and  the  total  collections  for  this  purpose 
for  the  year  1881  were  returned  at  $380,518.  Before  the 
war,  the  marine-hospital  tax  was  only  20  cents  per  month. 
In  the  Dominion  of  Canada,  the  equivalent  tax  is  only 
two  cents  per  ton,  payable  once  a  year  on  vessels  under 
100  tons,  and  three  times  a  year  on  vessels  over  that 
tonnage.  Should  the  owner  or  master  of  any  incoming 
vessel  desire  to  secure  special  permits  from  the  custom- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 85 

house  for  different  purposes,  he  may  do  so  by  paying 
20  cents  extra  for  each  paper.  Frequently  a  single  vessel 
will  require  half  a  dozen  of  these  permits.  A  wharfage 
tax,  imposed  by  the  State,  is  two  cents  per  ton  for  the 
first  200  tons,  and  one-fourth  of  a  cent  for  each  additional 
ton  per  day.  Then  come  the  expenses  of  towing  back- 
ward and  forward,  port-warden's  fees,  bills  for  unloading, 
etc. ;  and  by  the  time  that  the  ship-owner  has  disposed  of 
his  cargo,  and  settled  up  for  the  trip,  he  finds  that  a  good 
share  of  his  revenues  from  the  voyage  has  been  paid  out 
in  compulsory  fees  and  expenses.1 

Outgoing  vessels  from  New  York  experience  also  al- 
most as  much  inconvenience  and  expense  in  "getting 
away  "  from  port  as  do  incoming  vessels  in  "  getting  in  " 
to  port.  "  When  the  master  of  a  vessel  is  arranging  for  a 

1  The  following  exhibit,  copied  from  the  columns  of  "  The  New  York 
Times,"  shows  in  detail  what  it  cost  a  bark  of  654  tons,  arriving  from 
Manilla  in  the  spring  of  1882,  to  secure  a  landing  in  New  York  City:  — 

For  pilotage $80  50 

Health-officer's  fee 6  50 

Entry  fee  at  custom-house 55° 

Permits,  extra 40 

United  States  Hospital  money 64  oo 

Harbor-master's  charges 980 

Wharfage  fees 5  13 

Tonnage-duty,  30  cents  per  ton,  654  tons 196  20 


Total $368  03 

With  an  increase  in  the  size  of  the  ship,  the  expenses  as  above  enumer- 
ated will  of  course  also  increase. 


1 86  OUR  MERCHANT  MARIATE. 

voyage,  it  becomes  necessary  for  him  to  ship  his  crew.  If 
he  intends  going  to  any  other  than  the  West  Indies, 
Gulf,  or  Nova  Scotia  ports,  he  is  obliged  to  appear  before 
a  United  States  shipping  commissioner,  and  ship  his 
entire  crew  under  the  supervision  of  that  officer,  paying 
$2  per  man  for  so  doing.  The  law  requires  that  each  and 
every  seaman  about  to  sail  for  any  ports,  except  those 
mentioned  above,  must  appear  before  the  United  States 
commissioner,  sober,  and  sign  the  articles  there.  In  addi- 
tion to  the  fee  of  $2  per  man,  the  sailing-master  must 
obtain  from  the  commissioner  a  blank  for  the  official  log, 
two  blanks  for  the  ship's  articles,  and  two  blanks  for 
copies  of  the  crew-list.  The  cost  of  these  blanks  is  about 
$3.  After  arranging  every  thing  pertaining  to  the  crew, 
the  sailing-master  must  proceed  to  the  custom-house,  and 
obtain  his  clearance  papers.  For  an  American  vessel 
bound  for  a  foreign  port,  the  cost  of  these  papers  is  $3.25. 
Then  come  the  fees  for  outward-bound  pilotage,  which 
are  about  the  same  as  for  inooming  vessels." 

For  vessels  engaged  in  the  coasting  trade,  there  is  a 
different  system  of  fees  and  charges ;  and  these,  it  was 
recently  stated  (March  8,  1882)  by  Hon.  W.  H.  Frye, 
United  States  Senator  from  Maine,  have  increased  "  at 
least  ten  times,  within  the  last  twenty  years."  J  In  illus- 

1  "  The  old  fee  for  measuring  was  50  cents  a  ton  for  a  vessel  of  5  tons 
and  less  than  20.  If  20  tons  and  not  over  70,  it  was  75  cents ;  if  70  tons  and 
not  over  100,  $t ;  and  if  over  100  tons,  it  was  $1.50 :  and  yet  '  The  Louise  A. 
Boardman,"  under  your  laws  imposed  since  the  war,  was  compelled  to  pay 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  l8/ 

tration  in  detail  of  these  charges,  the  same  senator  detailed 
the  following  recent  experience  of  an  American  coasting 
vessel : — 

"Here  is  a  coaster  of  112  tons,  '  The  Louise  A.  Boardman:'  she 
wants  to  sail  from  one  of  our  ports  to  Calais,  Me.,  and  then  across 
the  river  a  quarter  of  a  mile  to  St.  Stephen's  in  the  Provinces.  We 
have  quite  a  large  trade  Avith  the  Dominion  of  Canada,  in  which  our 
vessels  are  engaged,  as  their  vessels  are  engaged  in  sailing  from  their 
ports  to  ours.  Now,  what  is  that  '  Louise  A.  Boardman '  compelled 
under  our  law  to  pay?  First:  new  vessel  112  tons,  enrolment  and 
bond,  $1.10;  license,  $i.-2o;  admeasurement,  $15,  —  making  $17.30. 
For  clearance :  register  and  bond,  $2.25 ;  certified  list  of  crew  and 
bond,  65  cents ;  certified  shipping-papers,  20  cents ;  entry,  $2.50 ; 
blanks,  40  cents,  —  making  $6  more.  Then  for  entry:  entry,  $2.50; 
hospital  money,  five  men,  one  month,  $2.  A  little  schooner  of  112 
tons  paying  $24  a  year  hospital  tax,  while  the  English  tax  is  only  two 
cents  a  month,  and  they  have  as  good  hospitals  as  we  do  !  Tonnage, 
112  tons  at  30  cents  a  ton,  making  this  little  schooner  pay  $33.60,  if 
she  happens  to  go  from  Calais  across  to  St.  Stephen's.  That  was 
nothing  but  a  war-tax,  never  imposed  before  the  war;  and  still  Con- 
gress permits  it  to  be  kept  on  these  coasting  vessels.  Further :  for 
permit  to  land,  20  cents ;  protections,  20  cents ;  bill  of  health,  with 
report,  20  cents;  blanks,  10  cents,  —  making  in  all  $38.80.  Again, 
charge  to  enrolment  and  license:  enrolment  and  bond,  $1.10;  li- 
cense, $1.20, —  making  $2.30.  That  American  schooner  of  112  tons 
burden  is  obliged  to  pay  under  our  laws  all  those  immense  and  bur- 

$15  for  that  admeasurement  instead  of  $1.50.  For  enrolment  under  the  old 
law  (before  the  war),  50  cents ;  now  $2.25.  For  license  under  the  old  law 
25  cents  not  over  20  tons,  50  cents  where  the  vessel  is  100  tons  and  not  under 
20,  over  loo  tons  $i."  —  Speech  of  W.  H.  Frye,  United  States  Senator,  Con- 
gressional Record,  AJarch  8,  1882. 


1 88  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

densome  taxes ;  and  the  attention  of  Congress  has  been  called  to  it 
again  and  again,  and  yet  no  relief  has  been  offered." 

"  What  does  '  The  Louise  A.  Boardman '  have  to  pay  if  she  gets 
out  papers  over  in  St.  Stephen's  instead  of  Calais?  She  would  be 
compelled  to  pay  two  cents  a  month  for  a  hospital  tax  per  man,  and 
$2  for  admeasurement,  and  no  other  namable  tax  whatever.  Where  a 
schooner  made  ten  or  twelve  voyages  from  our  ports  to  Canadian 
ports  in  a  year,  I  have  known  her  under  our  law  to  be  compelled  to 
pay  one-tenth  of  her  whole  value  for  United  States  taxes."  —  Con- 
gressional Record,  March  8,  1882. 

From  the  above  statements,  it  appears  that  what  may 
be  termed  the  "port"  or  "local"  taxes  and  charges  on 
American  shipping  are  excessive,  vexatious,  and  for  the 
most  part  unnecessary,  and  in  excess  of  the  correspond- 
ing charges  of  other  countries.  Nearly  all  of  them  were 
greatly  increased  during  the  war  period,  and  have  not 
since  been  reduced  in  common  with  other  similar  taxes 
on  domestic  industries  and  products.  It  should  be  also 
specially  noted,  that  the  Federal  Government  imposes  no 
such  taxes  and  restrictions  on  any  other  species  of  prop- 
erty or  other  branches  of  domestic  industry  as  it  does  on 
ships,  and  the  owning  and  employment  of  ships,  with  the 
exception  of  the  manufacture  and  sale  of  distilled  spirits 
and  tobacco,  under  the  internal  revenue  system  ;  and  these 
exceptions  exist  simply  because  the  obtaining  of  revenue 
from  them  is  considered  necessary  and  expedient,  — 
reasons  which  do  not  apply  to  ships  and  shipping. 


I 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  189 

An  Illustration  from  Real  Life  and  Experience. 

How  the  situation  operates  to  crush  out  all  spirit  of 
enterprise,  and  to  discourage  that  practical,  intelligent 
class  of  Americans,  who,  following  the  example  of  their 
fathers  and  the  traditions  of  their  country,  invest  their 
little  capital  or  earnings  in  ships,  and,  personally  super- 
intending what  they  invest,  try  to  make  a  living  from  the 
"  abundance  of  the  seas "  as  navigators  rather  than  as 
merchants,  may  perhaps  be  better  illustrated  by  the  fol- 
lowing incident  of  real  life  rather  than  by  any  abstract 
statements  :  In  1877  the  writer  was  one  of  a  commission 
appointed  by  the  authorities  of  the  State  of  New  York 
to  consider  and  report  on  the  subject  of  the  tolls,  the 
revenues,  and  the  commerce  of  the  canals  of  the  State; 
and,  as  a  part  of  the  investigation  which  was  instituted  in 
connection  with  the  same,  frequent  visits  were  made  in 
the  month  of  December  to  the  fleet  of  canal-boats,  which 
at  that  season  of  the  year  lay  up  for  the  winter  by  the 
acre  at  certain  piers  of  the  East  River  in  the  city  of  New 
York,  for  the  purpose  of  conference  with  the  men  whose 
lives  are  spent  on  the  canals,  owning  their  boats  in  many 
instances,  and  living  upon  them  continuously,  with  their 
families,  all  the  year  round.  As  he  was  leaving  a  pier 
near  Coenties  slip  one  day,  he  was  accosted  by  an  intel- 
ligent, typical-looking  sailor  as  one  could  wish  to  see,  who 
respectfully  requested  an  interview.  Other  engagements 
being,  however,  pressing,  and  the  stranger  confessing  to  a 


IQO  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

lack  of  all  information  respecting  the  canals,  the  interview 
was  avoided.  But  on  a  subsequent  day  the  writer  found 
himself,  as  he  was  again  leaving  the  pier,  again  con- 
fronted by  the  same  person,  when  the  following  conversa- 
tion ensued :  — 

"  Come,  now,  you  must  let  me  talk  to  you  a  little  to-day. 
I  know  who  you  are.  I  belong  up  in  your  State  of  Con- 
necticut, and  I  feel  as  though  I  had  a  right  to  consult 
you."  —  "Well,  my  friend,"  I  replied,  "what  do  you  want 
to  talk  about  ? "  —  "I  want  to  talk  about  my  business, 
which  is  about  as  bad  as  it  can  be."  —  "  What  is  your  busi- 
ness ? "  —  "I  am  the  captain  and  a  third  owner  of  that 
vessel,"  pointing  at  the  same  time  to  a  neat  two-masted 
schooner  of  three  hundred  tons  burden,  which  lay  on  one 
side  of  the  wharf ;  "and  I  run  regularly —  that  is,  if  I  can 

get  a  cargo  —  between  New  York  and ,"  naming  a  port 

in  Florida.  "  Won't  you  go  aboard  for  a  few  minutes  ?  " 

Before  accepting  the  invitation,  I  took  a  glance  at  the 
surroundings;  and  the  contrast,  in  respect  to  what  was 
going  on  at  the  opposite  sides  of  the  pier,  was  most 
striking.  Right  across  from  the  American  vessel  lay  a 
large  three-masted  ship  or  bark,  flying  the  Bremen  flag, 
and  taking  in  a  cargo  for  Rio.  Here  every  thing  was  life 
and  animation.  Carts  and  drays,  loaded  and  unloaded, 
coming  and  going,  formed  an  almost  continuous  proces- 
sion. The  cargo,  consisting  of  flour,  provisions,  turpen- 
tine, rosin,  and  cases  apparently  of  machinery  and  railroad 
equipments,  was  being  hoisted  in  at  both  bow  and  stern, 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE,.  IQI 

and  preparations  were  evidently  making  also  for  the  recep- 
tion of  a  deck-load  of  lumber ;  but,  on  the  other  side, 
where  the  American  vessel  was  moored,  every  thing  was 
dull  and  lifeless.  Taking  in  the  situation,  I  said  to  my 
new  friend,  "  Before  going  on  board  your  vessel,  tell  me 
the  explanation  of  all  this.  How  happens  it  that  you  do 
not  appear  to  be  doing  any  thing,  while  right  opposite 
there  is  evidently  plenty  of  business,  and  of  business  in  a 
hurry  ? "  —  "  Oh  !  "  said  he,  "  you  do  not  want  any  explana- 
tion. You  understand  it  well  enough."  —  "Perhaps  I  do," 
I  rejoined  ;  "  but  I  would  like  to  have  your  explanation."  — 
"  Well,  then,  that  chap  over  there  gets  his  vessel  and  all 
his  equipments,  to  commence  with,  at  from  one-third  to 
one-half  less  than  I  would  have  to  pay  for  the  same 
thing.  Then,  he  can  have  all  his  stores  free  of  duty. 
Nobody  troubles  him  about  what  sort  of  a  crew  he  shall 
have.  He  pays  considerably  less  than  I  do  ;  but  two  of 
such  men  as  I  can  get  are  worth  three  of  his  any  day. 
And  there  is  another  thing,  which  is  not  much  talked 
about,  but  it  comes  mighty  hard.  That  fellow,  I  under- 
stand, doesn't  pay  any  thing  in  the  way  of  taxes  where  he 
belongs  :  but  I  belong  up  in  Connecticut ;  and  my  vessel 
was  licensed  at  [naming  a  port  on  Connecticut  River], 
and  last  year  they  charged  me  almost  two  per  cent  on 
pretty  near  my  full  value.  But  I  tell  you  what  I  think  is 
the  meanest  thing  of  all.  Last  spring  I  got  a  chance 
to  charter  for  Rio,  —  just  where  that  feller  over  there  is 
going ;  and  before  I  could  start  I  had  to  walk  up  to  the 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

custom-house  and  pay  ninety  dollars,  cash  down,  for  the 
privilege,  which  is  almost  six  per  cent  on  all  we  earned 
last  year,  and  made  us  feel  so  poor  that  we  didn't  insure 
this  year,  and  if  any  thing  happens  to  the  craft  it's  a  dead 
loss."  —  "Taxed  you  ninety  dollars  !  "  I  replied,  with  a  feel- 
ing of  some  surprise  :  "  I  don't  quite  see  into  it."  —  "  Well, 
come  aboard  and  see  the  documents,  and  they  will  explain 
it."  And  going  aboard,  I  found  every  thing  as  attractive 
inside  as  out,  — the  wife,  a.  comely,  intelligent,  and  modest 
woman,  in  the  cabin,  competent,  as  the  husband  said,  to 
take  her  trick  at  the  wheel,  or  make  a  reckoning ;  a  little 
daughter,  in  addition,  who  was  setting  the  table  for  dinner ; 
and,  in  a  recess  of  the  cabin,  a  desk,  from  which  were 
produced  the  papers  that  explained  the  ninety  dollars 
specific  taxation.  It  seems  the  schooner,  having  been 
engaged  in  the  coasting  trade,  was  only  enrolled  or 
licensed,  and,  as  such,  was  not  liable  to  the  United 
States  tonnage-tax ;  but,  as  a  condition  of  going  to  Rio, 
—  i.e.,  engaging  in  foreign  trade, — was  required  to  be 
registered,  and  pay  a  tonnage-tax  on  so  doing  of  thirty 
cents  per  ton,  or  ninety  dollars  in  the  aggregate ;  and  as 
the  captain  showed  his  register  and  receipt,  and  put  his 
finger  on  the  evidence  of  his  payment,  he  said,  somewhat 
emphatically,  "  Considering  how  rich  Uncle  Sam  has  got 

to  be,  and  how  poor  our  business  is,  I  think  this  is  a 

poor  place  for  him  to  fish  for  revenue."  —  "But,"  said  I, 
"  as  you  seem  to  fully  understand  the  situation,  why  do 
you  not  talk  to  your  members  of  Congress  as  you  have 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  193 

talked  to  me  ?  Why  do  not  you  and  some  of  your  friends 
go  to  Washington,  and  plead  your  own  cause  ? "  —  "  Oh  ! 
that  would  be  no  use.  We  haven't  time  or  money  to 
spare ;  and  they  wouldn't  pay  any  attention  to  us  at 
Washington  if  we  went  there.  No  :  I  tell  my  wife  and 
partners  that  we  had  better  sell  out  next  spring,  and.  go 
at  something  else." 

Here,  then,  is  the  whole  case  in  respect  to  the  situation 
and  the  decline  in  American  shipping,  as  it  were,  in  a  nut- 
shell ;  embodied  in  this  simple,  pathetic  story  of  a  repre- 
sentative of  a  class  of  American  citizens  who  feel  that  their 
government  denies  to  them  the  protection  which  it  gives 
unsparingly  to  others,  treats  them  with  discriminating  in- 
justice, and  is  actually,  year  by  year,  crowding  them  out 
of  a  branch  of  national  and  legitimate  industry.  As  the 
man  whose  load  of  ashes,  in  going  up  hill,  had  all  dribbled 
out  at  the  end  of  his  cart,  said  to  the  boys  who  had  fol- 
lowed him  up  and  expected  to  be  edified  with  certain 
pungent  and  profane  remarks,  "  I  sha'n't  swear.  I  couldn't 
begin  to  do  justice  to  the  subject." 

Reference  has  been  made  to  the  circumstance,  that  the 
merchant  marine  of  Italy,  alone  of  the  States  of  Europe, 
is  in  a  state  of  marked  decadence,  analogous  to  that 
which  characterizes  the  merchant  marine  of  the  United 
States ;  and  investigations  recently  conducted  by  the 
Italian  Chambers  show  that  the  agencies  which  have 
mainly  contributed  to  such  a  result  in  the  former  country 
are  essentially  the  same  as  have  been  influential  to  the 


194  OUR   MERCHANT  MARINE. 

same  end  in  the  latter,  namely,  unwise  and  excessive  tax- 
ation. Thus,  for  example,  an  Italian  ship  is  subjected 
to  the  following  taxes :  anchorage  dues,  sanitary  dues, 
consular  dues ;  registry  and  stamp  taxes,  which  are  not 
defined,  but  are  numerous  and  onerous ;  a  property-tax 
which  is  calculated  at  13.20  per  cent  on  the  annual  reve- 
nue reduced  by  two-eighths ;  contributions  to  a  pension- 
fund,  which  may  be  estimated  at  200  francs  ($40)  per 
annum,  but  which  depends  on  the  number  of  the  crew ; 
a  tax  on  insurance  at  the  rate  of  2^  per  cent  on  the 
premiums ;  and,  finally,  a  considerable  number  of  minor 
charges,  as  for  "transcription  of  acts,"  "inspections," 
quay  dues,  etc.,  —  all  of  which  have  either  nothing  cor- 
responding in  the  charges  of  other  European  states,  or 
are  comparatively  much  greater.  Italy,  however,  can 
offer  one  plea  in  justification  of  its  policy  which  is  not 
available  to  the  United  States  :  namely,  that  its  finances 
are  in  such  a  condition  that  it  is  obliged  to  resort  to  every 
expedient  in  the  way  of  taxation  in  order  to  obtain  rev- 
enue sufficient  to  meet  its  expenditures.  Another  cause 
that  has  also  greatly  contributed  to  the  decline  of  Italian 
shipping  is,  that  the  country  has  tenaciously  clung  to  its 
sailing-vessels,  and  either  through  lack  of  enterprise  or 
capital  has  been  slow  to  avail  itself  of  the  economies  of 
steam,  and  of  necessity,  therefore,  has  lost  ground  in 
competing  with  other  countries.  Its  laws,  however,  place 
no  restraint  on  the  purchase  or  use  by  its  citizens  of 
vessels  of  foreign  construction. 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  195 


CHAPTER    X. 

THE  FUNDAMENTAL  CAUSE  OF  THE  DECAY,  AND  THE 
PRESENT  MAIN  OBSTACLE  IN  WAY  OF  THE  RESUSCI- 
TATION OF  THE  MERCHANT  MARINE  OF  THE  UNITED 
STATES. 

FROM  the  review  of  the  subject  under  consideration 
which  has  now  been  made,  it  would  seem  as  if  every  thing 
possible  had  been  done  to  discourage  and  prevent  the 
ownership  and  use  of  ships  for  the  purposes  of  ocean 
trade  and  transport  by  citizens  of  the  United  States. 
But  there  is  something  worse  and  more  singular  than 
any  thing  that  has  been  heretofore  related.  There  is  a 
large  and  most  influential  class  of  persons  in  the  United 
States  who  do  not  want  ships,  do  not  believe  in  their 
utility,  or  in  the  trade  and  commerce  of  which  they  are 
the  necessary  adjuncts  and  instrumentalities,  and  though 
restrained  through  fear  of  public  opinion,  in  a  great  degree, 
from  working  openly,  yet  never  fail,  while  professing  to 
the  contrary,  to  do  all  in  their  power  to  make  the  resusci- 
tation of  American  shipping  impossible.  And,  thus  far, 
their  efforts  have  been  eminently  successful. 

To  some,  perhaps  a  majority  of  readers,  these  aver- 
ments will  seem  utterly  preposterous  and  destitute  of  all 


196  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

foundation,  fit  only  to  be  characterized  as  the  mere  utter- 
ances of  a  theorist  and  one-idea  enthusiast.  But  let  us 
see  what  evidence  there  is  on  this  subject. 

And  first  may  be  cited  the  views  of  the  late  Henry  C. 
Carey  of  Philadelphia,  who  stands  in  relation  to  the  mod- 
ern doctrine  of  "protection"  very  much  the  same  as  the 
Prophet  Mahomet  does  to  the  religion  of  Islam.  Mr. 
Carey  expressed  the  opinion,  over  and  over  again,  that 
the  interests  of  the  United  States  —  material  and  moral  — 
would  be  greatly  benefited  if  the  Atlantic  could  be  con- 
verted into  an  impassable  ocean  of  fire,  and  also  that  a 
prolonged  war  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United 
States  would  be  one  of  the  best  possible  things  which 
could  happen  to  promote  the  industrial  independence 
and  development  of  the  latter  country.  Of  course  this 
was  only  another  way  of  saying  that  ships  engaged  in  the 
ocean  transport  of  passengers  and  merchandise  are  curses 
and  nuisances,  and  that,  the  sooner  they  and  the  trade 
which  gives  them  occupation  are  done  away  with,  the 
better  for  this  country.  It  was  a  re-indorsement  and  re- 
affirmation  of  the  Chinese  policy  of  hostility  to  foreigners 
and  all  things  foreign,  when  the  Chinese  themselves, 
after  centuries  of  experience,  are  proposing  to  do  away 
with  it. 

Horace  Greeley  also  taught  substantially  the  same  doc- 
trine to  the  day  of  his  death.  Thus  to  all  who  have 
rejoiced  at  the  great  domestic  prosperity  which  during  the 
years  1878-81  resulted  primarily  from  the  large  foreign 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  1 97 

demand  at  good  prices  for  our  agricultural  products,  the 
following  quotation  from  "The  New  York  Semi-Weekly 
Tribune"  of  April  8,  1870,  is  commended  for  considera- 
tion :  — 

"  When  a  railroad  brings  artisans  to  the  door  of  the  farmer,  it  is 
a  blessing.  When  it  takes-  the  wheat,  the  flesh,  the  corn,  and  the  cot- 
ton to  a  distant  manufacturing  centre,  a  locomotive  is  an  exhauster  : 
its  smoke  is  a  black  flag,  and  its  whistle  is  the  scream  of  an  evil 
genius." 

Now,  if  this  doctrine  is  correct,  then  the  country  has 
no  worse  enemies  than  its  great  railroad  constructors  and 
administrators.  The  men  who  are  stretching  Mr.  Gree- 
ley's  black  flag  over  every  landscape,  and  filling  the  ears  of 
the  whole  nation  with  the  screams  of  demons,  who  have 
made  it  possible  for  the  most  ordinary  mechanic  in  New 
England  to  transport,  at  the  cost  of  one  day's  wages,  a  year's 
subsistence  in  bread  and  meat  a  thousand  miles,  or  from 
Chicago  to  Boston,  ought  forthwith  to  be  hunted  down 
and  subjected  to  speedy  and  exemplary  punishment.  Ac- 
cording to  this  doctrine,  furthermore,  the  country  needs 
no  ships  for  ocean  transport,  and  to  seek  to  promote  their 
construction  and  employment  by  subsidies  is  certainly 
akin  to  a  crime.  We  ought  also  to  grow  no  more  wheat, 
corn,  and  cotton,  raise  no  more  cattle,  pack  no  more 
pork,  and  barrel  no  more  petroleum,  than  are  needed  for 
our  absolute  domestic  necessities.  Again  :  in  an  inter- 
view with  the  late  Mr.  Greeley,  in  the  summer  of  1872, 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

when  he  was  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency,  he  said,  "  If 
I  could  have  my  way,  I  would  impose  a  duty  of  $100  on 
every  ton  of  pig-iron  imported  into  the  United  States,  and 
make  the  rate  unchangeable  for  twenty  years.  That,  sir, 
is  my  idea  of  what  our  tariff  should  be."  But  the  plain 
meaning  of  this  was  (if  Mr.  Greeley  was  in  his  right 
mind),  that  he  would  by  law  prevent,  ships  engaged  in 
ocean  transport  from  obtaining  any  profitable  employment 
whatever. 

But,  barbarous  and  repulsive  as  are  these  doctrines  and 
teachings  of  Messrs.  Carey  and  Greeley,  there  is  even 
something  more  singular  to  be  reported.  Thus  the  Uni- 
versity of  Pennsylvania,  which  claims  to  rank  among  the 
first  educational  institutions  of  the  country,  openly  teaches 
to  its  students  that  it  is  not  expedient  that  the  United 
States  should  have  any  foreign  commerce ;  that,  if  there 
were  no  other  reason  for  discouraging  commerce,  the  de- 
moralizing effects  of  a  seafaring  life  would  be  quite  suffi- 
cient, and  that  it  would  be  much  better  to  hang  a  man 
than  allow  him  to  become  a  sailor.  In  confirmation  of 
the^e  seemingly  incredible  statements,  attention  is  asked 
to  the  following  quotations  from  Thompson's  "  Social 
Science  and  National  Economy,"  the  text-book  for  in- 
struction in  economic  science  at  present  used  in  the  uni- 
versity referred  to.  In  it  the  author  declares  (p.  229),  "  the 
amount  of  a  nation's  foreign  commerce  the  worst  possible 
test  of  its  general  prosperity ; "  and  (p.  222),  that  "  com- 
merce between  distant  points  is  an  undesirable  thing,  as 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  199 

open  to  the  exercise  of  tyrannizing  power  by  traders  and 
their  combinations ; "  and  that  (p.  228),  "  if  there  were  no 
other  reasons  for  the  policy  which  seeks  to  reduce  foreign 
commerce  to  a  minimum,  a  sufficient  one  would  be  found 
in  the  effect  on  the  human  material  it  employs,"  as  if  a 
life  on  the  broad  ocean  were  more  demoralizing  than  an 
underground  existence  in  the  pits  and  shafts  of  a  coal- 
mine. "Bentham  thought,"  continues  our  author,  "the 
worst  possible  use  that  could  be  made  of  a  man  was  to 
hang  him :  a  wor.se  still  is  to  make  a  common  sailor  of 
him."  And  all  this  in  a  country  whose  foreign  trade, 
exports  and  imports,  for  the  fiscal  year  1881,  exceeded  a 
thousand  six  hundred  millions  of  dollars  ($1,675,024,318), 
and  which  considers  the  maintenance  of  a  navy  and  the 
constant  service  of  a  force  of  8,000  seamen  as  essential  to 
its  safety ! 

And  again  :  what  could  be  more  audacious  than  the 
adoption  and  indorsement  a  few  years  ago,  by  a  lead- 
ing citizen  of  Philadelphia,  —  the  president  of  the  so-called 
"American  Industrial  League,"  —  of  the  following  lines, 
which  he  prefaced  as  text  and  motto  to  an  article  in 
"The  Atlantic  Monthly"  on  "  International  Trade"  ?— 

"  Having  the  power,  you  have  the  right : 
One  asks  but  what  you've  got,  not  how  ? 
Talk  not  to  me  of  navigation  ; 
For  war,  and  trade,  and  piracy,  — 
These  are  a  trinity  inseparable." 


200  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

We  say  "  audacious ;  "  for  there  is  no  other  term  which 
so  fitly  characterizes  the  efforts  of  a  man  of  high  culture 
and  social  position  to  put  the  whole  body  of  thought  and 
action  of  the  community  directly  across  the  path  of  mod- 
ern civilization,  and  who,  in  this  latter  half  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  uses  the  words  which  Goethe  puts  into 
the  mouth  of  Mephistopheles, — or  the  Devil,  —  to  help 
strengthen  an  argument  of  his  own,  that  trade  and  com- 
merce are  in  all  respects  equivalent  to  "war  and  piracy." 

Again :  in  a  debate  in  the  United  States  House  of 
Representatives,  March  4,  1882,  on  the  features  of  our 
existing  consular  system,  the  chairman  of  the  Committee 
on  Appropriations,  Representative  Hiscock,  of  the  great 
commercial  State  of  New  York,  admitted  that  the  system 
was  "complex  and  to  some  extent  cumbersome,"  and  "an 
obstruction  to  the  importation  of  foreign  commodities." 
And  for  the  latter  reason  the  speaker  declared  himself  in 
favor  of  its  continuance  ;  for,  he  continued,  "  I  am  unable 
to  see  how,  when  you  relieve  the  commerce  of  the  coun- 
try of  the  weight  and  burden  of  the  consular  system, 
you  are  not  to  that  extent  abating  the  protection  which  is 
given  to  our  industries."  He  did  not,  however,  add,  what 
the  reader  would  do  well  to  bear  in  mind,  that  the 
existing  tariff  of  the  United  States  (1882)  averages  more 
than  40  per  cent  on  all  dutiable  importations  over  and 
above  the  protective  obstructions  created  by  our  consular 
system. 

Now,  the  minds  of  all  this  school  of   economists  are 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2OI 

perfectly  clear  in  respect  to  the  ideas  which  they  desire 
to  inculcate  and  the  policy  they  wish  to  carry  out  in  the 
United  States.  They  are  not  men  who  use  words  without 
meaning  and  signification.  They  do  not  believe  in  inter- 
national commerce.  They  do  not  believe  in  ships.  They 
want  none  of  them.  They  think  a  man  had  better  be 
hung  than  engage  in  ocean  transport.  They  do  not  in- 
corporate these  views  into  party  platforms ;  for  their  in- 
stinct tells  them  that  the  people  will  not  stand  very  much 
of  such  talk,  and  that  any  man  or  party  that  openly  in- 
dorses them  would  be  politically  condemned.  But  they 
have  accomplished  indirectly  what  they  would  not  dare  to 
strive  for  directly.  They  have  put  laws  upon  our  statute- 
books,  and  still  maintain  them  there,  which  practically 
forbid  American  manufacturers,  agriculturists,  and  mer- 
chants from  receiving  the  products  of  other  nations  in 
exchange  (payment)  for  their  own  ;  which  say,  in  fact,  to 
the  Chilian,  "We  want  to  sell  you  our  cotton  fabrics 
and  agricultural  implements,  but  you  shall  not  sell  us 
your  copper;"  and  to  the  producers  in  the  Argentine 
States,  Australia,  and  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  "We 
want  to  sell  you  clothing,  boots  and  shoes,  paints,  oils, 
and  gunpowder,  and  we  know  we  can  do  so  cheaper 
than  any  or  all  other  nations ;  but  we  won't  buy  the  prin- 
cipal product  —  wool  —  which  you  have  got  to  sell  (pay 
with)  in  return."  Now,  ships,  as  was  long  ago  pointed 
out,  are  the  children  and  not  the  parents,  the  effect  and 
not  the  cause,  of  commerce  ;  and  so  long  as  we  maintain 


2O2  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

a  commercial  policy  that  seeks  to  interrupt,  restrict,  or 
prevent  commerce  with  other  nations,  so  long  the  ships 
will  not  come  back  to  us  ;  for  their  employment  must  be 
limited,  even  if  they  were  placed  at  our  wharves  as  free 
gifts. 

How  we  Trade  with  South  America. 

In  proof  of  this,  let  us  take  one  of  many  illustrations 
that  are  available.  At  present  the  European  steamship 
service  with  South  America  comprises  British,  French,' 
German,  and  Italian  lines,  with  more  than  one  hundred 
steamers,  making  an  average  of  twenty-three  monthly 
trips  each  way.  In  1876  an  enterprising  firm  in  Boston, 
familiar  with  the  shipping  business,  and  desirous  of  par- 
ticipating in  this  large  South  American  trade,  established 
a  line  of  steamers  to  run  regularly  between  Boston  and 
Valparaiso.  The  ships  were  built  in  England,  the  capital 
invested  in  them  was  American  ;  but  their  registry  was  in 
London,  and  they  carried  the  British  flag,  and  were  com- 
manded by  a  British  captain.  After  two  years'  experience 
the  line  was  discontinued ;  and  the  United  States  has 
now  (1882)  no  regular  steam  communication  with  South 
America,  or  any  direct  way  of  reaching  any  <Sf  its  ports. 
The  main  reason  for  the  discontinuance  of  the  Boston 
line  was  as  follows  :  There  was  no  difficulty  at  the  outset 
on  outgoing  cargoes  ;  as  there  was,  and  still  is,  a  demand 
in  Chili  for  a  supply  of  American  farm  products,  cotton 
fabrics,  machinery,  hardware,  etc.  But  ships,  to  be  profit- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  203 

able,  must  earn  freights  both  going  to  and  returning  from 
a  market.  Now,  the  chief  commodities  that  Chili  has  to 
pay  for  or  give  in  return  for  our  products  are  copper  and 
copper-ores,  and  wool.  But  the  tariff  on  the  importation 
of  copper  is  wholly  prohibitory,  and  on  wool  nearly  so  ; 
only  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars'  worth  of  un- 
manufactured copper  having  been  imported  from  all  coun- 
tries in  1879,  and  about  two  and  a  half  tons  of  ore.  The 
consequence  was,  that  these  Boston  steamers,  in  order  to 
obtain  a  return  cargo  from  Chili,  were  obliged  to  take 
freight  of  wool  and  copper  for  Liverpool,  and  trans-ship  it 
in  bond  at  Boston  ;  and  such  a  method  of  doing  business 
proved  to  be  unprofitable.  Added  to  this,  the  vessels  em- 
ployed were  found,  after  experience,  to  be  not  so  well 
suited  to  the  requirements  of  the  trade  as  was  at  first 
expected.  Commenting  on  this  venture,  one  of  the  part- 
ners to  it,  in  a  recent  letter,  writes  as  follows :  — 

"  The  copper  product  of  Chili  now  nearly  all  goes  to  England, 
where  it  is  manufactured,  and  distributed  all  over  the  world.  There 
is  no  doubt  in  our  minds  that  the  United  States  would  by  this  time 
have  possessed  nearly  all  this  copper  trade,  had  it  not  been  for  the 
duty  imposed  about  fifteen  years  ago,  which  has  had  the  effect  to 
enormously  enrich  a  few  copper-producers  at  Lake  Superior,  at  the 
expense  of  the  rest  of  the  country,  which  consumes  their  production, 
or  rather  a  part  of  it  only,  as  they  now  export  about  one-quarter  the 
production,  and  sell  it  at  five  cents  less  per  pound  than  consumers 
here  have  to  pay  for  the  same  copper. 

"  We  have  no  doubt  that  the  reduction  of  the  duty  on  copper 
to  a  figure  that  would  still  allow  the  Lake  Superior  mines  a  fair 


2O4  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

profit,  would  so  increase  our  trade  with  Chili  as  to  permit  a  profit- 
able business  for  steamers,  and  we  should  pay  for  all  the  copper 
imported  with  our  manufactures  of  cotton,  iron,  wood,  etc." 


As  further  illustrating  how  the  present  tariff  policy 
cripples  the  use  of  ships,  and  shuts  us  out  from  the 
ocean  carrying  trade  in  a  way  that  a  repeal  of  naviga- 
tion, local  tax,  pilotage,  and  other  similar  laws  cannot 
remedy,  let  us  further  trace  the  incidents  of  this  Chilian 
copper  business.  Chili  now  exports  about  $17,500,000 
of  copper  and  copper  products.  It  nearly  all  goes  in 
British  ships,  which,  loaded  in  the  first  instance  with 
the  merchandise  which  Chili  wants,  —  i.e.,  cotton  goods 
(average  $55,000,000  per  annum),  hardware,  paints,  paper, 
machinery,  guns,  etc., — sail  for  Valparaiso,  earning  an 
outward  freight ;  arriving  in  Chili,  the  cargo  unloaded 
is  replaced  with  another  cargo  of  copper-ores  or  wool,  and 
the  ships  return  to  England,  earning  homeward  freights. 
Profitable  employment  is  thus  given  to  many  British 
ships,  and  an  explanation  in  great  part  afforded  of  the 
continued  supremacy  of  the  British  commercial  marine, 
which  strengthens  and  increases  just  in  proportion  as 
trade  increases.  Arriving  in  England,  the  copper-ores 
are  sold  to  the  copper-smelters  at  Swansea,  in  the  south- 
east of  England,  who,  in  converting  them  into  mercantile 
forms,  employ  English  labor,  English  capital,  English  rail- 
way service,  and  consume  large  quantities  of  English  coal. 
Smelted  into  ingots,  rolled  into  sheets,  or  converted  into 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2O5 

yellow  metal  or  brass,  the  Chilian  copper  is  finally  sold 
to  whoever  in  the  world  wants  to  buy, — and  all  the  world 
always  does  want  to  buy  copper  under  some  conditions, — 
and  out  of  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  the  Swansea  smelter 
pays  himself,  pays  the  cotton-spinner,  the  ship-owner,  the 
coal-miner,  the  common  carrier,  and  all  others  concerned ; 
the  movement,  as  a  whole,  being  in  the  nature  of  a  great 
circle  of  transactions,  in  every  one  of  which  some  profit 
accrues  to  English  capital,  and  some  opportunity  is 
afforded  to  English  labor.  But  in  this  great  and  special 
circle  of  production  and  exchange  American  capital  and 
labor  find  no  place. 

To  cap  the  climax  of  this  curious  chapter  of  our  com- 
mercial policy,  consider  now  how  the  American  ship- 
builder and  ship-owner  supplies  himself  with  copper. 
English  yellow  metal,  made  in  part  out  of  copper  pro- 
duced in  the  United  States,  and  sold  at  a  less  price 
than  the  American  producer  will  sell  to  the  American 
consumer,  is  admitted  free  of  duty  if  used  on  American 
vessels  not  engaged  in  the  coastwise  trade ;  while  copper 
and  copper  ore,  out  of  which  the  same  yellow  metal  could 
be  made,  is  not  allowed  to  be  brought  into  the  country  by 
reason  of  the  excessive  duty  imposed  on  its  importation. 
Could  there  be  any  thing  in  legislation  more,  supremely 
foolish  and  ridiculous? 

Something  of  an  approximate  measurement  of  the 
extent  of  this  Chilian  business  —  which  is  only  a  frac- 
tion of  the  total  South  American  trade  which  we  have 


206  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

declined  to  participate  in,  or  rather,  which  we  will  not 
allow  our  merchants  and  ships  to  attempt  to  participate  in 
—  may  be  obtained  from  the  fact,  that  out  of  an  entrance 
and  clearance  into  Valparaiso,  in  1877,  of  827  steamships 
and  1,319  sailing-vessels,  representing  a  total  of  1,447,368 
tons,  the  United  States  was  represented  by  68  sailing- 
vessels  only. 

Tariff  Reform   essential  to  the  Restoration  and  Develop- 
ment of  Shipping  Interests. 

A  radical  reform  of  our  whole  tariff  system  and  policy 
is  therefore  the  one  great  essential  for  the  restoration  of 
our  shipping  and  our  ocean  carrying  trade.  We  have  got 
to  recognize  the  fact,  that  it  is  our  present  absurd  protec- 
tive policy  that  has  made  it  impossible  to  maintain  our 
status  as  a  commercial  nation  upon  the  ocean.  We  have 
got  to  recognize  the  fact  that  the  present  pressing  neces- 
sity of  the  United  States  is  extended  markets  for  the 
continually  increasing  surplus  of  our  products,  —  me- 
chanical, mining,  and  fishing,  as  well  as  agriculture,  — 
that  for  obtaining  such  markets  ships  controlled  by  and 
employed  in  exclusively  American  interests  are  essential 
instrumentalities ;  but  that  such  markets  will  not  and 
can  not  be  obtained,  or  a  national  commercial  marine 
find  a  basis  for  growth,  or  even  existence,  so  long  as 
we  restrict  by  law  the  producers  of  this  country  from 
freely  exchanging  the  products  of  their  labor  with  the 
products  of  the  labor  of  the  producers  of  other  coun- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  2O? 

tries.  We  have  got  to  recognize  the  principle  that  all 
trade  is  essentially  barter,  product  being  exchanged  for 
product ;  that  in  order  to  sell  we  must  buy,  and  in  order 
to  buy  we  must  sell ;  that  he  who  won't  buy  can't  sell, 
and  he  who  won't  sell  can't  buy;  and  that  Justin  pro- 
portion as  buying  or  selling,  or  the  exchange  of  products, 
is  restricted,  to  just  the  same  extent  the  necessity  of 
having  instrumentalities  of  exchange  is  diminished. 

The  advocates  of  the  maintenance  of  the  extreme  pro- 
tective system  always  endeavor  to  avoid  and  befog  this 
phase  of  the  subject  under  consideration,  because  they 
know  full  well  that  an  examination  of  it  will  at  once 
expose  the  fallacy  of  the  scheme  of  attempting  to  revive 
the  merchant  marine  of  the  United  States  by  a  system  of 
subsidies ;  for  if  we  are  to  maintain  a  policy  which  in 
effect  proclaims  that  the  United  States  alone  of  all  the 
nations  of  the  world  is,  and  intends  to  be  as  far  as  possi- 
ble, independent  of  all  foreign  trade,  what  do  we  want 
with  ships  ?  It  is  also  popular  with  this  school  of  econo- 
mists, to  ridicule  our  export  business  as  of  little  account. 
"  Why,"  said  one  of  their  representatives,  at  the  Boston 
Shipping  Convention  in  1880,  "we  only  export  one-tenth 
of  our  agricultural  products ; "  but  he  omitted  to  men- 
tion that  this  one-tenth  amounted  in  that  same  year  to 
$655,000,000  in  value,  on  which  an  ocean  freight  reck- 
oned at  5  per  cent  would  have  amounted  to  over  $32,- 
000,000.  Why  was  not  the  question  asked  him,  "  How 
far  would  this  sum  have  supplied  the  place  of  subsidies  ?  " 


2O8  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

But,  in  place  of  that,  the  declaration  of  the  speaker 
was  received  with  great  applause,  as  if  it  was  a  matter 
of  congratulation  that  we  exported  so  little.  No  one, 
furthermore,  pointed  out  to  the  convention  that  an  ability 
to  find  a  market  abroad  for  this  one-tenth  of  the  product 
determines  whether  there  shall  be  any  profit  realized  on 
the  other  nine-tenths  which  we  market  at  home,  and  also 
whether  there  shall  be  for  the  whole  country  prosperity  or 
hard  times. 

Under  such  circumstances,  furthermore,  how  perfectly 
puerile  it  is  to  suppose,  as  has  recently  been  done  by  the 
representative  of  the  State  Department  at  Washington, 
that  foreign  commerce  —  on  which  ships  engaged  in  for- 
eign trade  must  subsist  —  can  be  extended  under  the  pres- 
ent tariff  by  authorizing  consuls  to  act  as  agents  for  our 
manufacturing  and  commercial  firms,  or  by  establishing 
more  direct  postal  communication  with  various  countries, 
as,  for  example,  South  America !  What  can  consuls  ac- 
complish so  long  as  our  tariff  policy  discourages  com- 
mercial intercourse  ?  Suppose  we  establish  a  weekly 
direct  mail  with  South  America,  and  this  mail  brings 
increased  orders  for  United  States  produce.  In  what 
manner  are  the  South  Americans  to  pay  for  such  orders 
and  sales  ?  The  Boston  experience  with  Chili  shows  that 
they  cannot  do  it  with  a  great  part  of  what  South 
America  produces  and  has  to  sell.  With  drafts  on 
England  ?  And,  if  by  drafts,  then  those  drafts  have  got 
to  be  represented  by  South  American  exports  to  England 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  209 

and  not  to  the  United  States.  Can  such  a  trade  as  this 
attain  any  magnitude  ?  Can  it  warrant  the  subsidizing  of 
any  steamship  company  ? 

Conclusion. 

From  this  review,  it  must  be  evident  that  no  one  meas- 
ure will  arrest  the  decay  of  American  shipping,  bring 
back  prosperity  to  our  ocean  carrying  trade,  or  revive  the 
industry  of  ship-building  in  this  country.  The  field  of 
reform  to  be  entered  upon  is  a  very  large  one ;  the  num- 
ber of  details  which  are  to  be  attended  to  are  numerous ; 
but  reform  nevertheless  is  both  possible  and  practicable  if 
the  American  people  desire  and  will  it. 

The  first  thing  to  be  done  is,  then,  to  educate  the 
people  up  to  a  full  understanding  of  the  subject. 

Second,  We  must  repeal  our  navigation  laws,  at  least  to 
the  extent  of  permitting  our  navigators  and  merchants 
to  supply  themselves  with  ships  on  conditions  as  favorable 
as  are  enjoyed  by  their  competitors,  who  are  the  mer- 
chants and  sailors  of  all  other  maritime  nations.  There 
is  no  other  way  in  which  we  can  supply  our  needs  in 
respect  to  ships  so  speedily.  Grant  to  the  subsidy  scheme 
all  that  its  friends  claim  for  it,  and  it  will  be  years  before 
any  considerable  results  will  accrue  from  its  adoption. 

Third,  If  we  are  to  build  ships  in  the  United  States  as 
cheaply  as  they  can  be  built  by  other  nations, — and  un- 
less we  can  do  so  the  ships  we  may  build  will  never  be 
voluntarily  bought  or  used  by  our  own  citizens  or  any 


2IO  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

others,  —  our  ship-builders  must  have  their  materials  for 
construction  as  cheap  as  the  builders  with  whom  they 
are  to  compete.  Either  allow  the  importation  free  of  duty 
of  all  the  material  and  stores  that  enter  into  the  con- 
struction and  equipment  of  ships,  or  reduce  the  tariff. 
So  long  as  the  business  of  constructing  iron  steamships 
has  to  bear  the  burden  of  high  prices  consequent  on  pro- 
tective duties  averaging  40  per  cent,  it  cannot  compete 
with  like  industries  in  free-trade  countries.  There  is  no 
possibility  of  evading  this  conclusion. 

Fourth,  If  foreign  competing  maritime  nations  do  not 
subject  their  ships  to  local  taxation,  the  United  States 
evidently  cannot  afford  to  do  so.  The  continuance  of 
such  a  discrimination  against  our  merchant  marine  of 
itself  and  alone  may,  and  probably  will,  be  sufficient  to 
prevent  its  resuscitation  in  face  of  a  foreign  competition 
exempt  from  similar  burdens.  Whether  Congress,  under 
the  power  conferred  upon  it  by  the  constitution  "  to  regu- 
late commerce,"  can  exempt  as  instrumentalities  of  com- 
merce vessels  engaged  in  foreign  or  inter-state  carrying 
trade  from  all  forms  of  local  —  state  or  municipal  —  taxa- 
tion, is,  however,  an  open  question.  The  decisions  of  the 
United  States  Supreme  Court  on  this  subject  look  both 
ways.1 

1  The  following  is  a  summary  of  the  most  important  of  these  decisions, 
and  the  inferences  deducible  from  them.  In  the  case  of  Weston  vs.  the 
city  of  Charleston  (2  Peters,  449),  the  Court,  through  Chief  Justice  Marshall, 
said,  "  The  power  to  tax  involves  the  power  to  destroy ;  "  and,  "  If  the  right 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE.  211 

Fifth,  Abolish  compulsory  pilotage,  and  reduce  the 
fees  for  pilotage  by  law  so  that  they  shall  not  be  in 
excess  of  those  charged  in  British  and  other  European 
ports. 

to  impose  a  tax  exists,  it  is  a  right  which  in  its  nature  acknowledges  no 
limits."  Once  concede,  therefore,  to  the  States  the  right  to  tax  the  instru- 
mentalities of  inter-state  or  foreign  commerce  in  any  degree,  and  you  concede, 
it  may  be  claimed,  to  the  States  the  right  to  say  there  shall  be  no  inter-state 
or  foreign  commerce  :  for  the  right  to  impose  one  per  cent  of  taxation  involves 
the  right  to  impose  100  per  cent;  or,  in  other  words,  the  right  to  tax  at  all 
involves  the  right  to  prevent.  Again :  in  definition  of  the  extent  of  the 
power  of  Congress  to  regulate  commerce,  the  Supreme  Court  in  the  case  of 
Weston  vs.  the  State  of  Missouri  (Otto  i,  pp.  275-283)  said,  "  Commerce  is 
a  term  of  the  largest  import.  It  comprehends  intercourse  for  the  purpose  of 
trade  in  any  and  all  its  forms,  including  the  transportation,  purchase,  sale,  and 
exchange  of  commodities  between  the  citizens  of  one  country  and  the  citizens 
and  subjects  of  other  countries,  and  between  the  citizens  of  different  States. 
The  power  to  regulate  it  embraces  all  the  instruments  by  which  such  com- 
merce may  be  conducted." 

Justice  Story  ruled  that  the  power  given  to  Congress  to  regulate  commerce 
with  foreign  nations  and  among  the  States  has  been  deemed  exclusive 
from  the  nature  and  objects  of  the  power  and  the  necessary  implications 
growing  out  of  its  exercise.  And  on  another  occasion  the  full  bench  hekt 
that  "  whenever  subjects,  in  regard  to  which  a  power  to  regulate  commerce- 
is  asserted,  are  in  their  nature  national,  or  admit  of  one  uniform  system  ot 
plan  of  regulation,  they  are  exclusively  within  the  regulating  coatroi  of 
Congress." 

In  the  celebrated  case  of  Gibbons  -vs.  Ogden,  Chief  Justice  Marshall  defined 
commerce  to  be  not  only  traffic,  but  "  intercourse  between  nations  and  part* 
of  nations  in  all  its  branches;"  and  he  added,  "  It  is  regulated  by  prescribing, 
rules  for  carrying  on  that  intercourse."  Enlarging  on  this  point,  he  con- 
tinued, "  The  subject,  the  vehicle,  the  agent,  and  their  various  operations,, 
become  the  objects  of  commercial  regulations."  And  of  late  years  this  idea. 


212  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

Sixth,  Repeal  the  tonnage-tax. 

Seventh,  Reduce  all  expenses  connected  with  the  hiring 
or  discharge  of  seamen,  consular  charges,  and  the  like,  to 
the  level  or  below  those  imposed  by  other  nations.  If, 

has  been  so  far  adopted  as  to  impute  to  Congress  the  power  to  determine  the 
circumstances  under  which  a  bridge  may  be  built  over  a  navigable  stream ; 
and  Congress  has  also  enacted  codes  regulating  in  a  minute  degree  the 
construction,  equipment,  and  navigation  of  steam-vessels.  In  the  case  of  the 
"State  Freight  Tax"  (15  Wallace,  282),  the  Court  through  Mr.  Justice 
Strong  said,  "  We  recognize  fully  the  power  of  each  State  to  tax  at  its  dis- 
cretion its  own  internal  commerce,  and  the  franchises,  property,  or  business 
of  its  own  corporations,  so  that  inter-state  intercourse,  trade,  or  commerce  is 
not  embarrassed  or  restricted.  That  must  remain  free."  "  No  State  can 
impose  a  tax  upon  freight  transported  from  State  to  State,  or  upon  the 
transporter  because  of  such  transportation."  This  decision  does  not  decide 
that  a  State  may  not  tax  the  vehicle  or  the  carriage  employed  in  such  trans- 
portation ;  but  it  is  obvious,  that  would  not  be  permitted  to  be  done  indi- 
rectly which  it  was  forbidden  to  do  directly. 

On  the  other  hand,  in  the  case  of  Brown  vs.  Maryland  (12  Wheaton,  431), 
Chief  Justice  Marshall  said,  "  Nothing  can  .be  more  fallacious  than  to  urge 
the  possible  abuse  of  power  by  the  States,  for  the  purpose  of  proving  that 
the  power  has  been  taken  away.  Such  an  argument  goes  to  the  destruction 
of  all  State  power."  In  the  case  of  the  "  State  Tax  on  Gross  Receipts"  (15 
Wallace,  293-294),  Mr.  Justice  Strong,  in  giving  the  opinion  of  the  Court, 
said,  "  No  doubt  every  tax  upon  personal  property,  or  upon  occupations,  busi- 
ness, or  franchises,  affects,  more  or  less,  the  subjects  and  the  operations  of 
commerce.  Yet  it  is  not  every  thing  that  affects  commerce  that  amounts  to 
a  regulation  of  it  within  the  meaning  of  the  Constitution.  We  think  it  may 
safely  be  asserted,  that  the  States  have  authority  to  tax  the  estate,  real  and 
personal,  of  all  their  corporations,  including  carrying  companies,  precisely  as 
they  may  tax  similar  property  belonging  to  natural  persons  and  to  the  same 
extent.  We  think  also  that  such  taxation  may  be  laid  upon  a  valuation,  or 
may  be  an  excise.  It  must  be  admitted  that  a  tax  upon  any  article  of  per- 


OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

however,  the  decline  of  American  shipping  continues 
much  longer,  these  reforms  will  be  unnecessary,  for  there 
will  be  no  sailors  hired  or  discharged ;  and  no  necessity  of 

sonal  property  that  may  become  a  subject  of  commerce,  or  upon  any  instru- 
ment of  commerce,  affects  commerce.  If  the  tax  be  upon  the  instrument, 
such  as  a  stage-coach,  a  railroad-car,  or  a  canal  or  steam  boat,  its  tendency  is 
to  increase  the  cost  of  transportation.  Still  it  is  not  a  tax  upon  transporta- 
tion or  upon  commerce,  and  it  has  never  been  seriously  doubted  that  such 
a  tax  may  be  laid." 

The  question  at  issue  would  therefore  seem  to  be  :  can  local  taxation  of  the 
vehicles  of  commerce  be  considered  as  a  regulation  of  the  commerce  itself? 
If  it  is,  then  Congress,  within  the  meaning  of  the  Constitution,  has  exclusive 
power  to  tax  that  great  class  of  property  owned  by  American  citizens  which 
is  or  may  be  employed  in  the  foreign  trade.  The  sphere  of  the  appli- 
cation of  this  power  admits  also  of  the  following  illustrations :  "  A  boat 
owned  in  Maine,  and  employed  exclusively  in  carrying  passengers  between 
Portland  and  Eastport,  would  be  liable  to  tax  according  to  the  laws  of  that 
State ;  but,  the  moment  it  extended  its  trips  to  St.  John,  the  Maine  authori- 
ties would  lose  all  rights  in  it.  If  such  a  case  were  taken  to  the  Supreme 
Court,  that  would  have  to  be  its  decision  to  harmonize  with  those  of  the 
past."  Let  it  be  admitted  further,  that  Congress  can  exempt  vessels  running 
between  the  United  States  and  foreign  countries  from  local  taxation  by 
States  of  the  Federal  Union,  and  the  exercise  of  this  prerogative  would 
seem  to  embrace  and  carry  with  it  the  right  to  forbid  the  States  from  taxing 
vessels  or  vehicles  —  i.e.,  railroad-cars  —  employed  as  instrumentalities  for 
the  transaction  of  inter-state  commerce.  The  best  way  out  of  the  difficulty, 
pending  action  of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court,  would  therefore  seem  to 
be  for  all  the  States,  recognizing  the  axiom  in  taxation,  that  it  is  not  neces- 
sary to  tax  every  thing  to  tax  equitably,  to  exempt  vessels  from  direct  taxa- 
tion ;  or,  apart  from  any  economic  principle,  follow  the  example  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, New  York,  and  Massachusetts,  and  exempt,  as  a  matter  of  simple 
expediency,  vessels  engaged  in  foreign  trade  from  all  direct  taxation,  leaving, 
if  needs  be,  only  their  income  liable  to  taxation. 


214  OUR  MERCHANT  MARINE. 

invoking  the  co-operation  of  consuls,  for  there  will  be  no 
ships  engaged  in  foreign  trade. 

Eighth,  Reform  the  tariff,  and  the  natural  resources  of 
our  country  and  the  intelligence  of  our  people  are  such, 
that,  with  the  reduction  of  the  burden  of  taxes  and  prices 
consequent  on  low  rates  of  duty,  we  shall  regain  in  the 
next  twenty  years  more  than  we  have  lost  in  the  last 
twenty,  and  become  the  first  maritime  nation  of  the 
world. 

Ninth,  Without  resorting  to  the  artificial  expedient  of 
subsidies  and  bounties,  let  Congress  assimilate  steamships 
and  railroads  in  their  treatment,  to  the  extent  of  pay- 
ing steamships  for  carrying  the  mails  of  the  United 
States  good  compensation,  —  as  good  as  the  government 
now  pays  railways  for  performing  similar  service.1 

1  The  United  States  now  pays  the  steam-lines  carrying  her  European 
mails  five  francs  per  kilogramme  for  letters,  and  50  centimes  per  kilogramme 
for  papers ;  these  rates  having  been  fixed  by  the  International  Postal  Con- 
gress. Practically,  this  amounts  to  an  average  of  about  $600  per  trip. 
Returning  from  Liverpool,  the  sum  is  a  trifle  greater,  because  England  pays 
for  the  detention  of  the  steamers  at  Queenstown.  All  the  lines  running  from 
New  York  to  Liverpool  carry  the  mails  at  these  rates,  except  the  National. 
The  White  Star,  Inman,  and  Cunard  carry  the  Liverpool  mails  to  New  York. 
The  lines  running  between  New  York,  Havre,  Antwerp,  and  Hamburg  get  a 
similar  rate  fixed  by  the  International  Postal  Congress.  An  American  line 
running  to  the  same  ports  should  obviously  receive  the  same  compensation, 
the  conditions  of  safety  and  expedition  being  satisfactory;  for  the  Post-Office 
Department  could  legitimately  follow  no  other  rule  than  to  get  its  service 
done  at  the  lowest  cost  possible. 


INDEX. 


African  slave-trade  maintained  by  New  England,  72. 

America,  British  opinion  in  1783  of  commercial  advantages  of,  70. 

South,  how  the  United  States  trades  with,  202. 
American  commmerce,  obstructions  to,  advocated,  200. 
merchant  marine,  cause  of  decadence,  45. 
vessels,  percentage  of  exports  and  imports  carried  by,  21-23. 
Americans,  shall  they  own  ships  ?  37. 
Ames,  Fisher,  absurd  speech  of,  73. 

Anchor,  questionable  use  of,  as  a  symbol  of  American  industry,  170. 
Austria,  payments  for  ocean-steamship  service,  167. 

Belgium,  payments  for  ocean-steamship  service,  167. 
Bounties,  French  system  in  aid  of  shipping,  33,  162. 

revival  of  American  shipping  by,  137. 
British  factories,  industrial  value  of  operatives  in,  43. 

iron  tonnage  built  in  1876-1881,  28. 

ocean  carrying  trade,  value  of,  40,  41. 

registered  tonnage,  27. 

shipping,  amount  of,  43. 
Buckle,  Henry,  opinion  respecting  navigation  laws,  95. 

Canada,  charges  imposed  by,  on  shipping,  184,  187. 

Capital,  investment  of  foreign,  in  American  vessels  forbidden,  77. 

Carey,  H.  C.,  wishes  the  Atlantic  a  sea  of  fire,  195. 

Chili,  trade  of  the  United  States  with,  201,  204. 

China,  American  steamers  in,  169. 

merchant  marine  of,  32. 
Chinese  commercial  enterprise,  32. 

Coasting  trade  of  the  United  States,  curious  provisions  concerning,  88,  89. 
Codman,  Capt.  John,  prophecies  of,  50. 
Colonies,  American,  British  restriction  on  the  trade  of,  4. 
Commerce,  first  restrictions  on,  in  the  United  States,  71. 

foreign,  discouraged  in  the  United  States,  201. 

opposition  of  American  protectionists  to,  196,  197. 

of  the  globe  for  1880,  value  of,  43. 

215 


2l6  INDEX. 

Constitutional  convention,  Federal,  debate  in,  concerning  navigation  laws,  62. 
Consular  fees,  excessive,  advocated  as  obstructions  to  American  commerce,  200. 

system,  American  and  British  compared,  181. 

Contraband  trade  of  the  American  Colonies,  5.  % 

Court,  United  States  Supreme,  opinions  and  decisions  respecting  the  regulation  of 

commerce,  210,  213. 

Cunard  Steamship  Company,  fiscal  condition  of,  30. 
origin  of,  154. 
Parliamentary  inquiry  respecting,  154. 

Disraeli,  speech  in  opposition  to  repeal  of  British  navigation  laws,  102. 
Duties,  United  States  discriminating,  on  indirect  importations,  80. 

Exports,  relation  of,  to  domestic  prices,  207. 

Fathers  of  the  Republic,  opinions  of,  concerning  foreign  commerce,  5,  8. 
Fawcett,  Professor  Henry,  testimony  concerning  British  ocean-steamship  service,  161. 
Fisheries  of  the  United  States,  tonnage  employed  in,  19. 
France,  decay  of  commercial  marine  of,  33. 

ship-building  and  navigation  in,  162. 

treaty  of  1778  with  the  United  States  in  respect  to  commerce,  7. 
French  commercial  marine,  33,  162. 
Freights,  represent  exports  or  imports,  35. 
ocean,  value  of,  38. 

Germany,  mercantile  marine  of,  29. 

payments  for  ocean  mail  service,  167. 
proposition  in,  to  grant  shipping  bounties,  165,  166. 
Grain  exports  from  United  States  in  1880-81,  26. 
Great  Britain,  balance  of  trade  in,  how  settled,  40,  43. 

former  commercial  illiberality  of,  67. 

how  and  why  she  repealed  her  navigation  laws,  95. 

iron  tonnage  of,  28. 

policy  of  ocean  mail  service,  159. 

tonnage  of,  in  1880,  27. 
Greece,  mercantile  marine  of,  31. 

Greeley,  Horace,  opinions  respecting  foreign  commerce,  197. 
Guion  line  of  steamers  never  subsidized,  160. 

Hamburg,  protest  of  merchants  of,  against  shipping  bounties,  168. 
Hancock,  John,  arraignment  for  smuggling,  5. 
History  of  the  United  States,  curious  chapter  in,  60. 
Holland,  merchant  marine  of,  31. 

payments  for  ocean  mail  service,  167. 
Hospitals,  marine,  taxation  for,  on  shipping,  184. 

Importations  into  the  United  States,  in  what  vessels  forbidden,  80. 
Industry,  national,  relations  to  ocean  carrying  trade,  40. 


INDEX.  217 

Iron  vessels  of  the  United  States,  28,  29. 

Great  Britain,  28. 

Italy,  decay  of  its  commercial  marine,  33,  193. 
payments  for  ocean  mail  service,  167. 

Lindsay,  W.  S.,  opinions  concerning  British  navigation  laws,  96. 
Losses  contingent  on  the  decay  of  American  shipping,  34. 
Lloyds,  Austro-Hungarian,  30. 

McCulloch  on  British  navigation  laws,  96. 

McKay,  A.  D.,  estimates  of  value  of  British  carrying  trade,  40,  4.. 

Marine,  American  merchant,  decay  of,  45,  48. 

subsequent  to  the  Revolution,  8. 
period  of  decay,  18. 

development,  i. 
merchant,  of  China,  32. 

Germany,  29. 
Greece,  31. 
Holland,  31. 

Martin  Luther,  letter  concerning  origin  of  navigation  laws,  61,  62. 
Massachusetts,  interest  as  a  colony  in  shipping,  4. 

Navigation  laws,  British  experience  of,  96,  98. 
in  general,  95. 
of  Great  Britain,  94,  96. 

the  United  States,  origin  of,  58. 

provisions  of,  75. 

the  result  of  a  compact  with  slavery,  72. 
repeal  of,  in  Great  Britain,  102. 

not  alone  sufficient  to  resuscitate  American  shipping,  167, 

171. 

New  England  responsible  for  extension  of  the  slave-trade,  72,  73. 
slave-trade  prosecuted  by,  72. 

Pilotage,  compulsory,  182. 

fees  for,  in  port  of  New  York,  182. 

Piracy  and  commerce  regarded  as  analogous  by  protectionists,  198. 
Pitt,  William,  liberal  commercial  policy  of,  in  1783,  68. 
Postal  subsidy,  what  constitutes,  161. 
Protection  inconsistent  with  the  development  of  American  shipping,  201. 

Railroads,  destructive  effects  defined  by  Horace  Greeley,  197. 
Ricardo,  views  respecting  British  navigation  laws,  98. 
Remedies  for  decadence  of  American  shipping,  209. 
Repairs  of  vessels  in  the  United  States,  value  of,  34. 

Sailing  vessels,  disuse  of,  114. 

when  made  subject  to  duty,  80. 


2l8  INDEX. 

Sailor's  life  regarded  as  disreputable  by  protectionists,  198. 
Sheffield,  Lord,  curious  policy  of,  for  restricting  American  shipping,  69. 
Ships,  American,  building  and  use  of,  during  colonial  period,  3,  4. 
economy  in  management  of,  n. 
former  superiority  of,  n,  12. 
exempt  from  taxation  in  Great  Britain,  176. 
local  taxation  of,  in  Canada,  187. 
in  Illinois,  178. 

in  the  United  States,  172,  191. 
Ships,  iron,  superiority  of,  116. 

taxed  not  able  to  compete  on  the  ocean  with  ships  untaxed,  179. 
wooden,  disuse  of,  114. 
Ship-building  and  ship-using  in  foreign  countries,  26. 

the  United  States,  21,  26. 

free  import  of  foreign  articles  used  in  construction  of,  174. 
Shipping,  American,  agencies  concerned  in  decay  of,  45,  48. 
commencement  of  decadence,  20. 
decadence  not  attributable  to  war  of  1861-65,  2a 
increased  use  and  demand  for,  between  1850  and  1860,  24. 
organized  opposition  to  restoration  of,  195. 
story  illustrative  of  present  condition  of,  189. 
"Sirius,"  a  pioneer  ocean  steamship,  16. 

Slavery  and  the  navigation  laws  of  the  United  States,  connection  of,  59,  72. 
Slave-trade,  extension  of,  until  1808,  72. 

Smuggling,  prevalence  of,  during  the  American  colonial  period,  5. 
Statesmen,  British,  views  respecting  repeal  of  navigation  laws,  102,  105. 
Steamers,  iron,  first  practical  use  of,  52. 

pay  for  performance  of  mail  service,  214. 
profits  of  modern-built,  29. 
screw,  introduction  of,  51. 
Steamships,  British,  not  taxed  directly,  176. 

ocean,  local  taxation  of  in  England  and  the  United  States,  compared, 

172,  174. 
Steam-marine,  ocean,  of  Great  Britain  in  1880,  19. 

origin  of,  16. 

of  the  United  States,  origin  and  development  of,  16. 
commencement  of  period  of  decay,  1 7. 
Steam-tonnage  of  Great  Britain,  27. 

the  United  States,  27. 
Subsidies  in  aid  of  American  shipping,  136. 

French,  to  shipping,  162,  164. 
Sumner,  Professor  W.  G.,  on  the  American  ocean  carrying  trade,  37. 

Tariff  reform  in  the  United  States  essential  to  the  prosperity  of  American  shipping, 

206. 
Taxes,  tonnage,  American  and  foreign,  179. 


INDEX.  219 

Taxation,  local,  burden  on  American  shipping,  172. 

English  and  American  systems  compared,  172-174. 
of  vessels  in  foreign  trade,  power  of  Congress  to  exempt  from,  210 
theory  of,  1 72. 

without  reciprocal  protection,  spoliation,  177. 
Tea,  discriminating  duties  on,  80. 
Tonnage,  British  and  American  systems  of  measurement,  179. 

increase  of,  in  1879-80,  44. 

foreign,  engaged  in  trade  with  the  United  States  since  1860,  28. 
of  the  United  States,  maximum  of,  9. 

and  Great  Britain  in  1861,  9. 
enrolled  and  registered  in  1880,  18 
world  in  1861,  8,  9. 
taxes,  35,  179. 

oppressive  nature  of,  in  the  United  States,  86. 
Trade  compared  to  piracy,  200. 

essentially  barter,  207. 
Transportation,  ocean,  as  a  branch  of  industry,  35. 

Union,  flag  of,  comparative  shrinkage  of,  on  the  ocean,  illustrated,  23,  24. 
United  States  commercial  policy  in  respect  to  shipping,  54. 

losses  contingent  on  the  decay  of  her  ocean  marine,  34. 

original  policy  concerning  foreign  commerce,  5. 

people  of,  do  not  enjoy  the  maritime  privileges  of  other  nations,  56. 

tonnage  owned  by,  in  1880,  18,  19. 

value  of  her  ocean  carrying  trade,  38. 

Vessels,  American,  repairs  in  foreign  ports  made  dutiable  as  imports,  81. 
annual  value  of  construction  in  the  United  States,  34. 
built  in  Great  Britain  in  1881,  28. 

the  United  States  in  1881,  18,  19,  34. 

charges  for  entrance  and  clearance  from  port  of  New  York,  185. 
coasting,  what  constitutes,  in  the  United  States,  79. 
foreign,  not  importable  into  the  United  States,  75. 
iron,  owned  in  the  United  States  in  1881,  28. 
merchant,  increase  in  employment  for,  between  1850  and  1880,  24. 
when  enrolled  and  when  registered,  93. 

erected,  restrictions  on  repairing,  if  of  foreign  construction,  in  the  United 
States,  84, 

Wages,  "  three  months'  system,''  182. 

War  of  the   Rebellion  not  the  cause  of  the  decay  of  the  shipping  of  the  United 

States,  20. 
West  Indies,  starvation  in,  as  the  result  of  British  navigation  laws,  67. 

Yacht  "Oriole,"  curious  experience,  92. 


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Railroad    Accidents ;     their      Causes     and     Prevention. 


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